LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

i^Hp. ®0{a|rig]^ Ifu* 

ShelfJh[.M 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 



Sewerage and Land Drainage. Illustrated. 4to. 400 pages. New 
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How to Drain a House. Practical Information for Householders. 
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How to Drain a House 

PRACTICAL INFORMATION FOR 
HOUSEHOLDERS 

/ ^^ 

GEO. E. WARING, Jr., M. INST. C. E. 

Consulting Engineer for Sanitary Drainage. 
SECOND EDITION, WITH ANNOTATIONS 




NEW YORK ' 

D. VAN NOSTRAND COMPANY 

1895 



f^ 






Copyright, 1895, 

BY 

D. VAN NOSTRAND CO. 



< 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER. 

Prefatory : Our Enemy the Drains, . 

I. House-Drains and Health, 

II. Drains of the Average House, 

III. The Policy Adopted, 

IV. The Healthfulness of the House, 

V. Foundation and Cellar, . 

VI. Foul Drainage, 

VII. Specific Advice — as to Plumbing, 

VIII. The Sewer-Gas Question, . 

IX. How the Simplification of Plumbing will 

Affect the Plumber, 

X. Main Line and Main Traps, 

XI. Fresh-Air Inlets, . 

XII. Material and Construction of the Main 

Drain, .... 

XIII. The Soil-Pipe, . ' . 

XIV. Ventilating Cowls on Soil-Pipes, 
XV. Traps and Trap Ventilation, 

XVI. Non-Siphonic Traps. 



Ill 

I 

12 

22 
24 
29 
51 
56 
63 

68 
73 
79 

82 
86 

94 

98 

113 



CONTENTS. 



XVII. Plumbing Appliances, . . . 120 

XVIII. Slmplicity, Economy, and Convenience, . 124 

XIX. Wash-Stands, . . . .127 

XX. Water-Closets — the Dececo, . -130 

XXI. Sinks — the Dececo Flush-Pot, . . 143 

XXII. Overflows and Stop-Cocks, . • 153 

XXIII. An Example of Simple and Good Work, . 162 

XXIV. Owners, Architects and Plumbers, . 166 
XXV. Sewage I^isposal, .... 174 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



FIGURE 

1. Gravel Drain under Cellar Floor near Foun- 

dation, ..... 

2. Tile Drain, with Muslin Joint, 

3. The Top Finish of a Soil Pipe, 

4. The Crooks and Angles of Trap-Vent Pipes 

5. Putnam's Trap, .... 

6. The " Puro " Trap, 

7. The Dececo Water-Closet, 

8. " " Flush-Pot for Sinks, 

9. Flattened Sink Waste, . 

10. Hidden Overflow of Bath, 

11. Standing Overflow and Plug for Bath, 

12. Double Chambered Flush-tank, 

13. The Rhoads-Williams Siphon, . 

14. Plan of Sub-surface Irrigation System, 

15. 
16. 

17. Method of Laying Disposal Tile, 

18. 

19. •* 



33 
34 
95 

107 

115 
118 

134 
146 

151 

155 
158 
187 
190 
195 
195 
195 
200 
200 
201 



X ILLUSTRATIONS, 

figure page 

20. Open Flush-tank (Section), . . . 209 

21. " " (Plan), ... * 209 

22. " " (Cross-Section), . .210 

23. Straining Basket for Flush-tank, . .211 

24. Wire Screens for Flush-tank, . .211 

25. Plan of Surface Disposal System, . .215 

26. " " *< .. . ^ 215 

27. Combined Surface and Sub-surface Disposal, 216 

28. Gutter, Tile, and Cap, .... 217 

29. Open Flush-tank (Masonry Construction), ,218 

30. Distributing Chamber, .... 220 

31. Operation of Distributing Chamber, . 222 

32. " " " . . 222 

33. " *' " . . 222 



Note. — The text of this book applies to conditions existing 
in 1885. The notes at the ends of the chapters relate to 
progress made since that date. 



PREFATORY: OUR ENEMY THE 
DRAINS. 



The drains In average modern houses 
are probably the most serious and preva- 
lent enemies with which struggling 
humanity has to contend. But, at the 
worst, they are only Incidentally enemies, 
and they are never necessarily so. 

All of the intended purposes of the 
drains are wholly beneficial. With all of 
their defects, it is not too much to say 
that on the whole the world is much bet- 
ter off with them than it would have been 
without them. Defective though they 
often are, whether in the house or in the 



IV PRE FA TOR V. 

Street, they have probably been, next after 
the introduction of a pure water-supply, 
the most important factor in the reduc- 
tion of the death-rate. 

That a country town, depending en- 
tirely on outside privies and on cess- 
pools,— with all that their use implies in 
the way of exposure and irregularity of 
habits, and of the fouling of the ground 
and the air — would be vastly improved 
in its sanitary condition by the introduc- 
tion of even an imperfect system of 
sewerage and with plumbing-work of 
a very low and ordinary character, is 
not to be doubted. Therefore, at the 
worst, one enemy has displaced another, 
and the new one is much less to be 
dreaded than the old. 

What we still need is continued prog- 
ress in the right direction. As indoor 
water-closets are better than out-of-door 
privies ; as defective waste-pipes are better 



PRE FA TOR V. V 

than none ; and as bad sewers are better 
than cess-pools, so will good substitutes 
for all of these defective things lead to 
still further Improvement. 

In the following pages the subject Is 
approached entirely from the point of view 
of the individual householder — he who has 
got so far on In wisdom as to know that 
Imperfect drainage Is an enemy to the 
well-being of his household, and that by 
abolishing the Imperfections, the enemy 
can be disarmed and made a most useful 
ally. 

The drainage system is, however, a 
trustworthy ally 07ily so lo7ig as the woman 
of the house holds It under close and 
careful supervision. 

Her whole duty Is not done when her 
husband has paid a good round sum to 
the engineer and to the plumber. It Is 
only begun. 

There has been placed under her con- 



Tl PRE FA TOR V. 

trol a means of safety, or an engine of 
destruction, according as she performs 
her duty, or neglects it. She can not 
safely delegate her responsibility to her 
servants. Her own eye must see that at 
no point, has neglect, at any time, per- 
mitted even the beginning of filth — for 
the beginning of filth is the beginning of 
danger. It marks the desertion of the 
ally to the ranks of the enemy. 

G. E. W., Jr. 

Newport, R. I., December, 1884. 



HOW TO DRAIN A HOUSE. 



CHAPTER I. 

HOUSE DRAINS AND HEALTH. 

FORTY years ago the best houses In 
American cities were little if at all 
better in the matter of drainage than are 
the best houses of Paris, with very rare 
exceptions, to-day. They had at best only 
one drain to remove the kitchen waste 
and another to drain the cellar. All 
the water used was carried by hand and 
it was used in limited quantities. The 
bath was an exceptional luxury ; the water- 
closet was almost unknown, and the un- 
speakable horrors of the privy, the close- 



2 HO USE DRA INS A ND BE A L TH. 

Stool and the sick-chair — still dominant in 
undrained houses, and especially in coun- 
try houses — were accepted as an inevitable 
incident of human life. Happily, we are 
now emerging from this barbaric condition, 
and are learning to regulate our appliances 
according to the dictates of health and 
decency. A dozen years ago in a pamphlet 
description of the earth-closet, then re- 
cently invented, I wrote the following, 
which is as true of country houses now 
as it was then : 

Out-of-door privies, those temples of de- 
fame and graves of decency, that disfigure 
almost every country home in America, 
and raise their suggestive heads above the 
garden-walls of elegant town-houses, are, I 
believe, doomed to disappear from off the 
face of the earth. Thirty years ago, every 
back-yard in New York City was provided 
with one of these buildings ; now, since 
the water-closet has come into universal 



HOUSE DRAINS AND HEALTH. 3 

use, probably there are not twenty of 
them to the square mile. Twenty years 
hence, it Is to be hoped, they will become 
equally rare In smaller towns and In the 
country. That they are objectionable 
on the score of decency and comfort, will 
be confessed by all. What Is not so gen- 
erally understood Is their pernicious 
effect upon health. The Influence of 
subterranean stores of fecal matter In 
the propagation of disease has already 
been referred to, and will be more fully 
discussed hereafter ; but that which pro- 
duces. In the aggregate, far worse re- 
sults — the aggravation of the difficulties of 
delicate females — has attracted less atten- 
tion than its importance deserves. It Is 
universally admitted that nothing Is more 
injurious to health than irregularity and 
the undue retention of the rejectamenta 
of the intestines. It Is not necessary to 
quote scientific authority to prove to any 



4 HOUSE DRAINS AND HEALTH. 

person of intelligence that in prompt and 
regular attention to this duty lies the car- 
dinal secret of health. We have all been 
reminded, in our own persons, that our 
health and efficiency, as well as our 
cheerfulness and good humor, depend on 
perfect regularity in this regard. There 
can be little question that the prevailing 
female complaints are often induced, and 
always intensified, by disorders of the 
digestive organs, and the oppression in 
the lower regions that neglect in this 
matter causes. Admitting the justness of 
the view, let us see what chance a woman 
living in the country has to escape the 
direst evils that ''delicate health" has in 
store for its victims. The privy stands, 
perhaps, at the bottom of the garden, 
fifty yards from the house, approached by 
a walk bordered by long grass, which is 
always wet except during the sunny part of 
the day, overhung by shrubbery and vines, 



HOUSE DRAINS AND HEALTH. 5 

which are often dripping with wet, and 
sometimes exposed to the public gaze. In 
winter, snow-drifts block the way, and dur- 
ing rain there is no shelter from any side. 
The house itself is fearfully cold, if not 
drifted half-full with snow or flooded with 
rain. A woman who is comfortably 
housed during stormy weather will, if 
it is possible, postpone for days together 
the dreadful necessity for exposure that 
such conditions imply. If the walk 
is exposed to a neighboring work-shop 
window, the visit will probably be put off 
until dusk. In either case, no amount of 
reasoning will convince a woman that it is 
her duty, for the sake of preventing 
troubles of which she is yet ignorant, to 
expose herself to the danger, the discom- 
fort, and the annoyance that regularity 
under such circumstances implies. I 
pass over now the barbarous foulness 
and the stifling odor of the privy- 



6 HOUSE DRAINS AND HEALTH. 

vault. It is only as an unavoidable evil 
that these have been tolerated ; but I 
can not too strongly urge attention to the 
point taken above, and insist on the fact 
that every consideration of humanity, 
and of the welfare not only of our own 
families, but of the whole community, 
demands a speedy reform of this abuse. 
It will hardly be believed by my more 
civilized readers that, over more than 
half of the older settled parts of the 
United States, even the every-way ob- 
jectionable system that I have described 
is comparatively unknown, and that the 
corn-field and the thicket are the only 
retreat provided, while the majority of 
farmers' houses, even at the North, are 
most inadequately supplied. In view 
of the foregoing facts, I make no apol- 
ogy for calling the attention of women 
themselves to this important matter, 
believing that they will universally con- 



HOUSE DRAINS AND HEALTH. 7 

cede that, however much of elegance 
and comfort may surround them in the 
appointments of their homes, their mode 
of Hfe is neither decent, civiHzed, nor safe, 
unless they are provided with the con- 
veniences that the water-closet and the 
earth-closet alone make possible. 

As a positive source of disease, and as 
the occasion of a most injurious irregu- 
larity, the barbarous appliances of our 
ancestors, still existing in connection 
with nine-tenths of the habitations of the 
United States, were and are doubtless 
more injurious, even at the arm's length 
at which they were held, than are the 
average water-closets of average city 
houses. In saying this, however, it is not 
intended to be understood that these 
average modern appliances are acceptable 
as any thing but makeshifts — though 
relatively good, they are absolutely bad. 

That their injurious effect on health is 



8 HO USE DRA INS A ND HE A L TH. 

practically as bad as theoretically It ought 
to be, Is not obviously true. Many of 
their victims die In Infancy, and so large 
a number of those who pass this critical 
period withstand their evil effects, that it 
has come to be believed by the people at 
large that the outcry against them is an 
unreasonable one. 

Perhaps all popular outcry is unreason- 
able, but certainly those who will take the 
trouble to Investigate the condition of the 
drainage of an average house, supplied 
with the usual plumbing appliances, will 
find defects at every turn — not merely 
slight defects which It would on the whole 
be better to avoid, but generally very 
grave defects which it is absolutely neces- 
sary to eradicate before we can hope to 
secure those conditions of perfect health 
which we have a right to demand of the 
civilization of which we boast. In periods 
of epidemic, or when cholera or yellow 



HOUSE DRAINS AND HEALTH. g 

fever is apprehended, the popular imagi- 
nation on the subject becomes excited, 
and the long death-roll which pestilence 
creates gives an almost dramatic force to 
the stronger arguments advanced against 
our imperfect plumbing work. 

As a matter of statistics, however, the 
deaths caused by any epidemic, and the 
degree to which these are favored by bad 
drainage, are of very secondary impor- 
tance. The thousands of deaths from 
yellow fever in New Orleans, and in 
Memphis, and in the Mississippi Valley 
generally, in 1878 and 1879, fairly shook 
the country with terror. They amounted 
in all, in both years, to less than twenty 
thousand. 

Their suddenness and their concen- 
tration gave them their striking effect. 

In the country at large there are annu- 
ally not fewer than one million deaths, and 
not fewer than two hundred thousand of 



I O HO USE DRA INS A ND HE A L TH 

these are from directly preventible dis- 
eases. Not fewer than one hundred 
thousand of these latter probably owe 
their origin to diseases occasioned by de- 
fective drainage or by the Improper reten- 
tion of fecal matter and other organic 
wastes. 

This enormous preventible death is, 
from the point of view of the political 
economist, only an index of something 
worse. Each preventible death doubtless 
represents, taking one disease with an- 
other, twenty cases of preventible sick- 
ness, and each such case of sickness 
implies at least twenty days of suffering 
and disability with its serious Incidental 
cost in nursing and medication. 

The real benefit, therefore, that is to 
accrue to the community from the estab- 
lishment of perfect sanitary regulations, 
in the house and in the town, aside from 
the establishment of greater vigor and 



HO USE DRA INS A ND HE A L TH. 1 1 

efficiency, and of increased ability to 
withstand insalubrious conditions, Is to be 
sought not so much in the prevention of 
these deaths as In the abolition of the dis- 
eases which cause them. 

As in the town, so In the Individual 
house, we shall be safe if our attention is 
given only incidentally to the saving of 
life, but directly to the preservation of 
health, /. e., to the removal of all those 
conditions which affect the purity of the 
atmosphere In which we live, involving, of 
course, the purity of the ground on which 
our houses are built and the absolute pre- 
vention of the putrefaction any where 
within or near the house of its organic 
offscourings. 

Note. — In all of the larger towns there has been, since 
1885, a very marked improvement in the character of the 
plumbing work done. In the older town houses, and in 
village and country houses, little advance has been made. 



CHAPTER II. 

DRAINS OF THE AVERAGE HOUSE. 

A HOUSE completely equipped for 
convenient modern life has two 
systems, comparable to the arterial and 
venous systems of the living animal. 

Its water supply is taken from the 
street main, or from the private reservoir 
or tank, and carried through tight pipes 
to the different points where convenience 
requires it to be delivered. This supply 
may easily be secured against contamina- 
tion, and there is little trouble, if it is 
pure at Its source, in keeping It pure 
until it Is delivered for use. The venous 
system — that which has for Its office the 
removal of the water after use — the 



DRAINS OF THE A VERAGE HOUSE. 13 

water supply plus the burden of filth 
which has been added to it — has its main 
discharge through the outlet drain. 

The various points where the pure 
water is made foul are also conveniently 
distributed throughout the house. The 
drains begin usually as small lead pipes ; 
these lead to larger iron pipes and these 
to the main channel, sometimes of iron and 
sometimes of earthenware. The particular 
office which this venous system has to per- 
form is to remove all of the refuse of the 
house which is suited for transportation 
in water. This office it usually performs 
with such a degree of completeness as to 
satisfy the average demand of the house- 
holder, i, e.y when water is discharged 
from a vessel it runs into the waste-pipe 
and is not heard from again. What 
becomes of it after it passes out of sight, 
whether or not it and its filth are really 
removed from the house ; whether or not 



14 DRAINS OF THE A VERAGE HOUSE. 

the removal is so rapid and complete as 
to prevent deposits and accumulations, 
are questions about which the average 
member of the community is heedless. 

Lead pipes are usually tight. Iron 
pipes are connected together funnel-wise, 
so that whether they are tight or not the 
water runs away, and if the main drain 
does not carry to the outlet all that it 
receives, it leaks it out into the ground, 
where it is out of sight. 

There is more or less unpleasant smell 
here and there and often a sensation of 
closeness about the atmosphere of the 
whole house. These attract little atten- 
tion, because foul smells and closeness are 
generally accepted as a necessary incident 
of the production and disposal of filth. 

It is precisely the conditions which lead 
to these more or less obviously disagree- ' 
able sensations which constitute the main 
feature of the practical sanitary question. 



DRAINS OF THE AVERAGE HOUSE. 15 

1 have now In mind a large, elabo- 
rately decorated and richly furnished 
house In Fifth Avenue, New York, which 
I was called to inspect after a serious 
case of illness. The owner believed Its 
drainage works to be all right. They 
had cost a very large sum originally and 
they had been repaired at considerable 
outlay. 

Stationary wash-basins were distrib- 
uted throughout the house. The spaces 
under them were closely encased In 
fine cabinet work. There were two bath- 
rooms on each floor, containing the 
usual assortment of fixtures. The water- 
closets — their bowls elaborately deco- 
rated, some of them with gilt — were the 
usual '' pan " closets of the period. Every 
pipe v/as concealed behind partitions, and 
all traps and machinery were covered 
under the floor or behind elaborate car- 
pentry. The kitchen and pantry sinks 



1 6 DRAINS OF THE A VERAGE HOUSE. 

had waste-pipes two and a half inches in 
diameter, but were so filled with grease as 
to have but a thread of water-way left. 
The drains ramified in various directions 
under the floor of the cellar. These 
carried not only the wastes of the house, 
but the water from the roof. The waste- 
pipes in the house, in compliance with what 
was then believed to be the best practice, 
were vented with small air-pipes leading 
above the roof. There was no effective 
circulation of air in any part of the drain- 
age system. There were evidences of 
positive leakage at many points, and the 
lines occupied by the supply and waste- 
pipes continued, in groups, through every 
floor, so that the whole house, behind 
the partitions and between the floor 
beams, constituted an unobstructed air 
channel from the ceiling to the garret. 
A stale odor was perceptible in all the 
passage-ways and closets and staircases, — 



DRAINS OF THE A VERAGE HOUSE. 17 

wherever the open fire places did not 
afford free ventilation. 

It was demonstrated in the course of 
the inspection and renewal of the work, 
that the matters intended to be removed 
from the house were very largely only 
removed from sight. For lack of any 
thing like adequate flushing, the large 
waste-pipes and soil-pipes were lined 
with offensive slime ; the kitchen and 
pantry sink wastes were nearly filled with 
putrefying food involved in the con- 
gealed grease that had attached itself to 
their walls. The drains under the cellar 
leaked at many of their joints so as to 
saturate and render foul the earth under 
the concrete floor. A direct opening into 
the sewer, intended to drain the cellar 
floor, protected only by a bell trap, from 
which the water had evaporated, was 
pouring into the air of the house as much 
foul gas from the drain as could get 



1 8 DRAINS OF THE AVERAGE HOUSE. 

past the accumulated dust and cobwebs 
by which it was nearly obstructed. 

The chief complaint of the owner, and 
what he believed to be the source of all 
his woe, was that the public sewer was a 
foul one and that his house was pervaded 
with sewer gas. This may or may not 
have been the case. Whether it was or 
not, it was clearly demonstrated that 
there existed in the house itself, and 
almost throughout its whole drainage 
system, from the ''container" of every 
water-closet, coated on the inside nearly 
half an inch thick with fecal matter, 
to the point where the main drain passed 
through the foundation wall — a more 
than ample source of all the difficulty. 

Certain it is that when the work was 
reconstructed, though the sewer remained 
as before, the atmosphere of the house 
became, and still continues, perfectly pure. 

The reconstruction of the work was sub- 



DRAINS OF THE AVERAGE HOUSE. 19 

stantially in accordance with the principles 
set forth in the following pages. 

This is certainly not an exaggerated 
illustration of the condition of the drain- 
age works of even the best houses of only 
a few years ago. Since then, not only 
has workmanship been greatly improved, 
but a number of radical modifications 
and reformations have been universally 
adopted. In some cities these reforms 
are enforced by rigid regulation of the 
health authorities. Nevertheless, a great 
majority of the houses in New York city 
as well as elsewhere are still in a very 
defective condition, and certain require- 
ments, which the better sanitary practice 
considers important, are almost entirely 
absent. 

The glaring mistakes of ten years ago 
are no longer repeated by reputable 
plumbers. The minor and more modern 
improvements which are still less gen- 



20 DRAINS OF THE A VERAGE HOUSE. 

erally appreciated will doubtless, before 
very long, be adopted into general prac- 
tice, and the whole community will benefit 
greatly thereby. 

It is still to be urged on every man and 
woman, who realizes the importance of 
perfection in this vital element of house 
construction, to anticipate the universal 
acceptance of the better processes and to 
insist that in their own cases at least, they 
shall be adopted forthwith. 

The apprehension of cholera may stimu- 
late attention to the subject, and that it 
may be urged on by each localized out- 
break of typhoid fever or other zymotic 
disease is to be expected ; but much more 
than this is to be desired and to be advised, 
i. e., to put the whole house into such 
perfect sanitary condition as to its waste- 
pipes, and as to its drains, that it can 
no longer by any possibility be a source 
even of the malaise, headache, dullness. 



DRAINS OF THE A VERAGE HOUSE. 21 

neuralgic affection, etc., which rob Hfe of 
so much of its comfort and usefulness. 
One may properly recall in this connection 
Poor Richard's recommendation : Take 
care of the pence and the pounds will 
take care of themselves. 

Look out well for the health-rate ana 
the death-rate will lose its significance. 



CHAPTER III. 

THE POLICY HEREIN ADOPTED. 

THE following chapters are presented 
as a simple and direct statement of 
some positive knowledge, and of more 
confident belief, about the drainage of 
houses. 

They are not addressed to that indif- 
ferent public which sees a good deal of 
nonsense in the theories of all reformers. 
They are not addressed to plumbers, who, 
as a rule, are little attracted and less in- 
fluenced by what is said by any body whose 
working years have not been given to 
plumbing work. They are not even ad- 
dressed to architects and engineers, who, 
whatever their own convictions, when 
they have convictions on this subject, so 
often find it necessary to compromise with 



THE FOLIC V ADOP TED. 2 3 

their mechanics and with their clients, and 
to be content with such improvements as 
it seems under the circumstances judicious 
to insist on. They are addressed to that 
limited class who are willing to learn, and 
with whom a promising suggestion be- 
comes a fruitful germ ; to the few who 
will agree with their teachings, and to the 
more who will take their propositions into 
earnest consideration without the inten- 
tion, and often without the result, of 
agreeing with them. 

Where they can be avoided, alternative 
suofeestions will not be made. If there 
are two ways of doing a thing, one right 
and the other only not wrong, the right 
way alone will be described. There is 
usually but one best way, and all that Is 
to be considered here Is purely and simply 
the best way of Improving the drainage 
of a human habitation, and of maintain- 
ing Its good sanitary condition. 



CHAPTER IV. 

THE HEALTHFULNESS OF THE HOUSE. 

THE house, and the ground under and 
about it, and the air with which it 
is filled and surrounded, should be as dry 
and as clean as the best constant effort 
can make them. To this end, the most 
intelligent care and the most earnest at- 
tention must be given to all details of con- 
struction, and, no less, to the details of 
maintenance. No house, however perfect 
its original condition, can remain in perfect 
condition if subjected to the deteriorating 
influences of even ordinary carelessness. 
Many a palace is a pig-pen in its hidden 
recesses, and where the light of day and 
the eye of a scrupulous housekeeper are 
withheld, there will those enemies of the 



THE HEALTHFULNESS OF THE HOUSE. 25 

human race, dirt and damp and decay, 
surely make their stand. The whole range 
of cubby-holes, dark cellars, uninspected 
closets, and those spaces about pipes and 
fixtures which are screened from observa- 
tion and withdrawn from the reach of care 
by the pernicious carpentry to which the 
plumbing art is so closely wedded, are, all 
of them, places to be suspected and as far 
as possible to be abolished. Where dark 
places must be maintained, they should 
be the chief objects of the householder's 
care. It is a wise old sanitary saying that 
'' where daylight can not enter the doctor 
must." 

Houses that are perfect, even in the 
general arrangement and construction of 
their drainage works, are extremely rare. 
Those which, having begun perfect, con- 
tinue so under daily occupation, are still 
more rare. So true is this that it is some- 
times asked if it is, after all, worth while 



26 THE HEALTIIFULNESS OP THE HOUSE. 

to encounter the additional expense and 
the constant attention that perfection 
demands ; whether, indeed, the world has 
not got on so well in spite of grave sani- 
tary defects that it is futile to hope for 
an improvement corresponding with the 
cost in money and time. 

The most simple and the sufficient 
answer to this is that the world has not 
got on well at all, and is not getting on 
well ; that among large classes of the 
population one-half of all the children born 
die before they attain the age of five 
years ; that those who come to maturity 
rarely escape the suffering, loss of time, 
and incidental expense of unnecessary 
sickness ; that the average age of 
all mankind at death is not one-half of 
what it would be were we living under 
perfect sanitary conditions ; that one of 
the chief items of cost in carrying on the 
world, to say nothing of the cost of bury- 



THE HEALTHFULNESS OF THE HOUSE. 27 

ing those who die, Is that of supporting 
and attending the sick and helpless ; that 
another great item Is the cost of raising 
children to, or toward, the useful age, and 
then having them die before they begin 
to make a return on the investment ; that 
the great object of a well-regulated life is 
to secure happiness for one's self and for 
one's dependents, an aim which is crushed 
to the earth with every death of wife or 
child or friend. 

There is a sentimental view, no less 
important, which need not be recited, but 
which is sufficiently suggested to the 
minds of all who have had to do with the 
sanitary regulation of houses by the fre- 
quency with which their services are 
called Into requisition only when the 
offices of the undertaker have been pen 
formed. No cost and no care would be 
too great to prevent the constantly recur- 
ring domestic calamities which have had 



2 8 THE HEALTHFULNESS OF THE HOUSE, 

their origin, and which have found their 
development, in material conditions that 
a little original outlay and a constant and 
watchful care would have prevented. 

The objects to be attained in the drain- 
age of a house and of its site are, first, to 
remove all causes of excessive dampness ; 
and, second, to provide a means for the 
water transportation of organic wastes to 
a safe point of disposal, in such a way as 
to prevent decomposition on the premises, 
and so as to exclude from the house all 
air which has been in contact with these 
matters after their discharge into the 
drainage system. 

The means for accomplishing these 
ends are of two distinct sorts : one allied 
to the drainage of agricultural lands, the 
other to the flushing of gutters. 



CHAPTER V. 

FOUNDATION AND CELLAR. 

THE first In order of execution, and 
although not first In Importance, still 
of absolute Importance, Is the work for 
preventing undue dampness of the Interior 
atmosphere, or of the walls, of the house 
by an actual Inflow of water, by an 
exhalation of vapor from the water 
contained In the soil, or by a soaking of 
the foundation. In the case of city houses 
occupying the whole width of the lots on 
which they stand, this drainage is neces- 
sarily confined to the cellar and founda- 
tions, and, as a rule, the water to be 
drained away can be delivered only into a 
public sewer — though there are frequent 



30 FO UN DA 7 'ION A ND CELL A R. 

exceptional cases where, by piercing an 
Impervious stratum of clay or other 
material, an outlet may be gained Into a 
porous stratum of gravel or sand below. 

Wherever the site Is on a deep and nat- 
urally well-drained bed of sand or gravel, 
the question of drainage as a means for 
removing soil-water does not present 
itself. But here another very serious 
difficulty Is to be encountered, having a 
different sanitary bearing, but of no less 
sanitary consequence. This relates to 
the protection of the house against exha- 
lations from the ground — not of moisture, 
but of the atmospheric Impurities of the 
subsoil. 

In the case of a country house, or of a 
town house standing In the center of a 
considerable area, it Is often the most 
efficient means for securing satisfactory 
drainage to apply a very thorough system 
of underdralning to the whole area about 



PO UN DA TION' A ND CELL A R. 3 1 

it and for some distance away, by laying 
independent lines of tile drains, not neces- 
sarily under the house at all, but so as to 
surround it on all sides from which water 
flows toward it, and in all cases at a depth 
considerably below the level of the cellar- 
bottom. 

It is seldom, even where a spring 
is struck in digging the cellar, that 
such drains, surrounding the site of the 
house, will not entirely divert the water. 
In this drainage of large lots, the charac- 
ter of the outlet is of secondary import- 
ance. All that is needed is that it shall 
be low enough for the free discharge of 
the flow of the drains. If the discharge 
be into a sewer, the drains should descend 
toward it with a sufficient fall to prevent 
foul water from setting back into them in 
the case of a gorging of the sewer at a 
point near the house. 

In the drainage of a city house occu- 



32 FOUND A TION AND CELLAR, 

pying the whole width of the lot, the 
same system is to be adopted, save that 
the drains, instead of being so placed as 
to surround the house and cut off water 
approaching it, must perforce be placed 
under or near the foundation to receive 
such water as may have reached its 
actual site. Here the question of out- 
let becomes a serious one. If the 
discharge must be into a sewer, then 
some special means must be adopted for 
preventing the return of the air of the 
sewer to the subsoil under the house. 

In the construction of these drains two 
courses may be pursued with perhaps an 
equally good result. One is, after having 
excavated the ditch and cleared its bot- 
tom of all loose dirt, to fill in to the 
depth of a foot with sand or gravel — 
and even fine sand will answer the pur- 
pose. The other is, to use agricultural 
drain-tiles, preferably of the smallest 



FOUNDATION AND CELLAR. 



zz 



size, say an inch and a quarter in diam- 
eter, laid at the bottom of a well-graded 
trench and continued to the point of 
outlet. 

Where tiles are used, the joints should 



-TTTTTTTTTTTr:' 




FIG. I. — GRAVEL DRAIN, UNDER CELLAR FLOOR, NEAR FOUNDATION. 



be wrapped twice around with strips 
of muslin drawn tight. This makes 
a perfect collar, holding the tiles in 
line, and affording much the best pro- 
tection that has yet been devised against 
the ingress of sand or silt, which usually 



34 FOUNDATION AND CELLAR. 

finds its entrance at the lower part of the 
joint, flowing in with the water as it 
rises with the general water-level and 
flows off over the floor of the tile.^' 
Before the muslin will have rotted away 
the soil will become so compacted as not 
to follow the water into the tiles. 




FIG. 2. — THE DRAIN, WITH MUSLIN JOINT. 

Where tile drains are used, it is a mis- 
take to marry them to other materials. 
Tile alone or gravel alone will make a 
very good drain — tile and gravel to- 
gether, not nearly so good when per- 

* This use of muslin is patented, but it is hereby dedicnted 
to the public to the extent of its use under or within the 
foundation-wall of buildings. 



FO UN DA TIOiV A ND CELL A R. 35 

manence is considered. Tiles should be 
laid on the bottom of a perfectly graded 
ditch, and should be compactly imbedded 
in the heaviest loam that is found in 
excavating. When covered to the depth 
of a foot, this clay should be well trodden 
down, so that if the tile could be taken 
out, leaving the earth undisturbed, we 
should find a complete matrix, or nidus, 
which had clasped it firmly at every 
point. The old marvel. How gets the 
water in ? is too lonof for discussion here. 
I beg the reader to take the word of an 
old drainer that it does get in — and get 
out — perfectly. 

The large pipe drains with wide joints, 
often with fractures ^Ivine access to ver- 
min — no less than the ''box drains," 
''French drains," "blind drains," and 
various other antique devices for getting 
rid of soil-water — are costly, cumber- 
some, and in the long run, inefficient, 



$6 FOUNDATION AND CELLAR. 

owing to their liability to obstruction. 
The amount of water that can ever be 
collected as a constant stream, except in 
the case of a very copious spring, even 
in very wet foundations, is extremely 
slight. A sand seam in the natural soil 
one-fourth of an inch thick is generally 
sufficient to carry it ; and it is such 
seams, carrying water in a slow but con- 
stant ooze, which usually produce our 
subterranean and surface springs. 

A tile an inch and a quarter in diam- 
eter will carry more water than can often 
be collected for a constant flow from 
the subsoil of half an acre of ground. A 
body of sand or gravel ten or twelve 
inches wide and of equal depth can not be 
so compacted, provided clay and loam be 
kept out of it, that it will not afford a free 
outlet for all the water that can reach it 
under these circumstances from the soil 
of an ordinary town lot. 



FO UN DA TION A ND CELLAR. 3 7 

As a rule, the tile will be found to 
be much cheaper than the other mate- 
rial. It is better always that the depth 
of the drain should not be less than 
two feet below the level of the foot 
of the foundation. The more rapid 
the descent the better, but even two 
inches in a hundred feet, with perfect 
grading, will remove a very large flow. 
Indeed, if the drain has no fall, or even 
if it be depressed in places, provided it 
have a good and unobstructed outlet and 
well-protected joints, its surplus water will 
be discharged as soon as the general level 
of the water reaches the overflow point. 

Where the water is to be delivered to a 
sewer, I should in any case recommend 
the making of the outlet drain, or a part 
of it, with sand or very fine gravel. I 
should at least make a break ten feet long 
in the course of the drain, and fill this 
with such material — fine enough not to 



$8 FOUNDATION AND CELLAR. 

allow the free transmission of sewer air to 
the drains under the house, which a con- 
tinuous tile drain would permit. I am 
aware that this recommendation is radi- 
cally different from what has generally 
been set forth ; but it long ago com- 
mended itself to my judgment, and has 
proven in practice to be entirely suc- 
cessful. 

It is a usual custom to connect the un- 
derdrains of a house with the drain carry- 
ing the foul water, and to connect with 
them, also, the rain-water conductors from 
the roof. In view of what we know of 
the ease with which the contained air of 
the subsoil may be contaminated, it is of 
the utmost importance, where the best 
results are sought, to deliver the under- 
ground water itself by an independent 
line guarded with absolute completeness 
against the possible invasion of sewage or 
foul air. Nowhere within the house, nor, 



FOUNDATION A^'D CELLAR. 39 

indeed, for some distance outside of it, 
should even the rain-water conductors 
deliver directly into this system. 

By the means just described, the actual 
superabundant water of the soil may be 
removed. 

In connection with the foundation 
and cellar, two things else demand 
attention. The first is the carrying up 
of dampness through the foundations into 
the walls of the house, and the exhalation 
of watery vapor, which, in the case of a 
heavy soil, however well drained, is of 
considerable amount. These difficulties 
attach chiefly to clayey ground. The next 
is the entrance into the house of the 
aerial exhalations of the soil. 

Even a clay soil contains a large 
amount of air, and under different cir- 
cumstances, such as chano^inof barometric 
pressure, the rise and fall of water 
in the soil, and the action of winds, 



40 FOUXDATION AND CELLAR. 

producing a strong draught in chim- 
neys, this air enters the cellar and the 
house. This difficulty, not serious in the 
case of stiff clay, increases greatly as the 
soil grows more porous and becomes more 
dry. For example : 

A pile of stones broken to the size 
of road-metal contains a very large 
amount of air, — how large we could 
determine by filling the voids with 
water and measuring its quantity. Every 
wind that blows, every change of tem- 
perature, every rise of water into the 
mass, drives out or changes a portion of 
this air. If at the bottom of the heap 
there lay a mass of carrion, its stench 
would be almost as perceptible as though 
the stones were not there. A bed of 
such stones sufficiently large and suffi- 
ciently compacted would make a dry, 
firm, safe foundation for a house — in 
many respects an excellent foundation. 



FO UNDA TION A ND CELL A R. 4 1 

But if the atmosphere of the house were 
not separated from that of the interior of 
the mass of stones by something much 
more effective than even the usual cellar- 
bottom concrete, and if the carrion were 
putrefying beneath, the state of things 
would not be the worst possible only be- 
cause the obvious offensiveness resultino- 
from the putrefaction with the free inter- 
change of atmosphere between the house 
and the foundation would insure the im- 
mediate removal of the cause of the 
stench. 

This mass of broken stone, with its 
putrefying carrion below and its human 
habitation above, is only an exaggerated 
illustration of what exists universally over 
wide ranges of country. Houses are 
sometimes built on coarse gravel. Here 
the atmospheric interchange is almost as 
free as in the illustration given. Some- 
times the travel is finer and mixed with 



42 FO UNDA TION A ND CELL A R. 

sand which, imposing by friction more 
resistance to the movement of the air, 
Hmits the interchange ; but interchange 
to the extent of free inhalation and 
exhalation always goes on. Nothing 
can prevent this from being active 
when chimneys are drawing strongly, 
while the house is sealed against the 
outer air ; when, indeed, as is so often 
and so widely the case on light soils, the 
whole practical ventilation of the house — 
that is, its intake of air — is from the 
ground under it, often flowing through 
and enriched by the various familiar fumes 
of ill-kept cellars. 

The putrid carrion, it is true, w^e do 
not find in such concentrated condition as 
to produce an insufferable stench ; but let 
us examine the case of a certain village. 
It is not necessary to name it. There is 
not a State in New England in which 
many of its parallels may not be found, 



FOimDAriON AND CELLAR 43 

and, indeed, there is hardly a village in 
the whole country built on a porous soil 
where corresponding conditions do not 
exist. 

The village that I have in mind was 
built on a fiat deposit of gravel inter- 
mixed with very coarse sand, lying nearly 
level and extending in depth about fifteen 
feet to the permanent level of the adjacent 
tidal waters. It was a considerable village 
throughout the first half of the century ; 
then it began to expand into an important 
railroad town. It has now a large popu- 
lation and much wealth. It has a water 
supply, and ''all the modern improve- 
ments" — all except sewers. Its disposal 
of household waste of all kinds is not 
tipoii the soil, which would be obviously 
indecent, but into the soil, which has the 
supposed advantage of hidden indecency. 

The result must inevitably be a diffusion 
throughout the whole underlying ground- 



44 FOUND A TION AND CELLAR. 

work of the village of putrefying kitchen 
grease, and fecal matter and laundry 
slops, which can not fail to produce in the 
whole atmosphere of the gravelly earth a 
condition of marked contamination. Even 
in the milder season, however free the 
interchange between the air in the ground 
and the air over it, the air of so much of 
the grx)und as lies under houses can not 
be by any means ideally perfect. When 
the interchange between the outer air and 
the ground is cut off by frost, and when 
cellars and wells form almost the only 
means of communication, then the condi- 
tion is only infinitely worse. 

This description may seem at first read- 
ing too sensational, and dwellers on light 
soils will point with satisfaction to the 
relatively low death-rate that their com- 
munities furnish as contrasted with that 
of dwellers on damp clay soils, where this 
atmospheric interchange is practically in- 



FOUNDATION AND cellar: 45 

operative. This is no fair response. The 
death-rate is comparatively low under 
these circumstances, not because of, but 
in spite of, the almost universal breathing 
of the products of putrefaction as exhaled 
by the soil into the house. Could this 
element be withdrawn, it can not be ques- 
tioned that, on the lighter soil, the 
death-rate, and in larger degree the sick- 
rate, would show a much greater contrast. 
The practical question now arises, how 
to meet this difficulty } If proper sewers 
were once provided, an absolute suppres- 
sion of all vaults and cesspools would suf- 
fice to secure the early purification of the 
ground, for the bacteria of decomposition 
— those universal scavengers — would soon 
make away with the existing accumulation. 
How far their action may modify the pres- 
ent ill effects of the constantlv renewed 
underground filth we have as yet no 
means of knowing. If we are wise we 



46 FO UNDA TION A ND CELL A R. 

shall take the benefit of the doubt and cut 
off the supply of foul material. 

Sooner or later, we shall secure, by 
sewerage and a compulsory use of the 
sewers, the complete purification of the 
subsoil. In the meantime, the individual 
householder who has an anxious thought 
as to the condition of his Individual 
house, and who is now living subject to 
the influences of an evil due to his neigh- 
bors' many cesspools more than to his 
own single one, should seek some means 
to protect himself against enemies which 
his neighbors are willing to disregard. He 
will find his best protection in Isolating 
his house in the most effective way from 
the ground In which It Is founded. There 
is a common belief that stone walls laid 
In mortar, and cellar floors covered with 
a few Inches of concrete, effect such Isola- 
tion. This Is not the fact. Concrete 
floors and granite walls are as sponge to 



FO UN DA no y A .YD CEL LAR. 47 

the penetration under slight pressure of 
atmospheric currents. To what degree 
walls and concrete floors filter out the 
impurities of the air passing through 
them we do not know. Not knowing, we 
will not trust. 

One of the safest materials for a cellar 
bottom, and for the exterior packing of 
foundation walls, is a clean, smooth, 
compact clay, one which may be beaten 
into a close mass, and which has a 
sufficient affinity for moisture always 
to maintain its retentive condition. 
When used in the damp atmosphere of a 
cellar or about a foundation, it seems to 
constitute a good barrier to the passage 
of impure air. In the cellar it may, of 
course, be covered with concrete for 
cleanliness and for good appearance ; but 
six inches of clay well rammed while wet 
will impede the movement of air to a 
degree with which ordinary cellar con- 



48 FOUND A 7 VON AND CELLAR. 

Crete can furnish no parallel. Where 
clay is" not available, a good smearing of 
asphalt over the outside of the founda- 
tion-wall, and a layer of asphalt between 
two thicknesses of concrete for the cellar- 
bottom, will afford a complete though 
more costly protection. Asphalt used in 
substantially the same way, especially if 
in connection with a solid course of slate 
or North River bluestone, in the founda- 
tion above the ground level, will prevent 
the soaking up into the structure of the 
moisture of a heavy soil. 

The matters above touched upon are 
seldom discussed in works on house- 
drainage, except so far as the mere 
removal of surplus soil moisture is con- 
cerned, but their importance is not likely 
to be overestimated. 

There may be good grounds for the 
opinion of those who think that many 
of the minor ailments to which the 



FOUNDATION AND CELLAR. 49 

race is subject, and some of its more 
serious ailments as well, are due, not to 
the influence of an excess of filth in any 
form, but to the influence of an excess of 
moisture acting often on a little filth, 
or on a little oro-anic waste which would 
not be classed as filth at all. Such ailments 
prevail more especially in houses in which 
mold is prevalent, which on being closed 
soon acquire a musty smell, and in which 
stuffiness is a natural condition — houses 
where a general and all-pervading slight 
dampness is to be detected. This damp- 
ness may belong to the structure rather 
than to the climate ; for there are dry 
houses at the sea-side and damp houses 
on the mountains. 

The soil has an influence over the 
interior climate of the house, which is 
even stronger than external atmospheric 
conditions. Positive knowledore does 
not carry us very far in this direction, 



5 o FO UN DA 77 ON A ND CELLAR. 

but the experience and observation of 
the world, especially where intermittent 
fevers and neuralgia prevail and where 
an ailing condition and low tone are 
the rule, have indicated very clearly that 
the wisest course for every man who 
would make his home perfectly healthy 
would be to separate it as completely as 
possible from all interchange of air or 
moisture with the ground on which it is 
built. 



CHAPTER VI. 

FOUL DRAINAGE. 

ANOTHER and even more important 
branch of house-drainage has come 
into general use within a comparatively 
short time. This is now attracting quite 
all the attention that is its due. Knowl- 
edge concerning it is advancing steadily, 
and on the whole satisfactorily. Mistakes 
have been made during the past dozen 
years even by the best of those who have 
had to do with it. Such mistakes have 
from time to time become recognized, 
and they have been remedied, until we 
are now approaching something like a 
fair understandinor of the fundamental 
requirements of house-drainage. Perhaps 
it would be too much to say that the 
practice of the art keeps any thing like 



52 FOUL BRA IX AGE. 

even pace with the knowledge as to its 
principles. 

Neither the common usage of the best 
plumbers nor the average requirements 
of the boards of health of cities show any 
very considerable improvement over what 
was done in the better work of some 
years ago, save in better workmanship. 

Leaky joints in iron pipe, though still by 
no means uncommon, are less frequently 
found since attention has been given to 
testing joints underpressure. In the best 
work, the thorough ventilation of soil- 
pipes, furnishing an inlet as well as an 
outlet for the movement of air, is now 
generally adopted. Another step in ad- 
vance is marked by the abandonment or 
the much better construction of drains 
laid under cellar-bottoms. 

The greatest step of all — the step which 
Insured wide public benefit — was taken 
when municipal boards of health became 



FOUL DRAINAGE. 53 

SO generally, so almost universally, inter- 
ested in the subject of plumbing regula- 
tions. These bodies have nearly every 
where established an effective control 
over all new work done, and often over 
the amendment of old work. The main 
point being gained, that all such work is 
to be executed according to rules and 
under such inspection as will secure the 
observance of the rules, it is only a ques- 
tion of time when the rules themselves 
shall be perfected. 

As they stand, these plumbing regula- 
tions permit some things which they will 
hereafter prohibit, and they require some 
things which they will hereafter, perhaps, 
not permit. In the latter category is the 
back ventilation of traps, and in the for- 
mer the use of '' pan " water-closets, of 
fresh-air inlets at the level of the side- 
walk, and of bends, cowls, and caps at 
the top of the soil-pipe. 



54 FOUL DRAINAGE. 

However, in spite of all their imperfec- 
tions, the establishment of such regula- 
tions, and the rigorous enforcement of 
their requirements under actual inspec- 
tion, have marked the greatest progress 
that has been made for a long time past. 
It is to be remembered, in criticising 
these regulations, that they are necessa- 
rily made suitable for universal applica- 
tion. They are a very inadequate guide 
for the arrangement of the plumbing 
work of a large and elaborate house ; but 
they do constitute an invaluable guide 
and safeguard for work of a cheaper sort. 
The poor tenant, who was formerly at 
the mercy of his landlord, is now pro- 
tected by a system which must inevitably 
prevent the repetition of the infamous 
work of the cheap plumber of a few 
years ago. 

Note. — Fortunately, what is here said as to the com- 
mon usage of the best plumbers and the requirements of 



FOUL DRAINAGE. ^^ 

boards of health, is no longer true. Plumbers — of the 
belter class — have improved their methods and their 
work very greatly, and boards of health, so far as their 
need to regulate their requirements to the poorer classes 
will permit, are exerting a most beneficent influence over 
the house drainage of their towns. 

Board-of-health rules and regulations have been im- 
proving, year by year, and while they are still often far 
short of perfection, there is good reason to be satislied 
with the progress that is being made. 

" Pan " water-closets are quite generally prohibited, 
but the back ventilation of traps and the sidewalk air 
inlets still hold their sway. 



CHAPTER VII. 

SPECIFIC ADVICE. 

IT is no part of the purpose with which 
this book is written to discuss, even in 
a general way, the different methods and 
processes of house-drainage, nor the vari- 
ous theories and opinions by which dif- 
ferent writers on the subject are in- 
fluenced. It will be assumed that the 
reader will be satisfied to find here only 
the writer's own opinion, and a statement 
of the grounds on which that opinion is 
based. I shall therefore confine myself 
to saying what I advise doing, with the 
reasons therefor. 

I advise, above and before all, that in 
every house, large or small, the amount 
of plumbing work be reduced to the low- 



SFE CIFIC A D VICE. 5 7 

est convenient limit ; that there be not 
two sinks or water-closets or bath-tubs 
where one will suffice for reasonable con- 
venience ; that under no circumstances 
shall there be a wash-basin or any other 
opening into any channel which is con- 
nected with the drainage system, in a 
sleeping-room, nor ordinarily in a closet 
opening into a sleeping-room. I should 
confine all plumbing fixtures on bed-room 
floors to bath-rooms. 

I should give each bath-room exterior 
ventilation, but I should never locate its 
pipes against an outer wall unless I could 
give adequate protection against frost, for 
the liability to danger from the freezing 
of waste-pipes, traps, etc., is greater than 
the liability to danger from an interior 
location — if the fixtures are all of the best 
sort, and if the room itself is sufficiently 
ventilated. 

I should always, so far as possible, 



58 SPE CIFIC A D VICE. 

place the bath-rooms so nearly over each 
other on different floors, that they could 
all be connected by short waste-pipes 
with one vertical soil-pipe, or so that the 
soil-pipe could reach them with short off- 
sets. If bath-rooms or water-closets were 
required on all floors, or on any floor, in 
different parts of the house, I should 
serve each set with its own vertical soil- 
pipe, avoiding any considerable horizon- 
tal run, such as is at times resorted to in 
connecting fixtures at different points on 
different floors. 

I should try, so far as possible, to have 
every part of the plumbing work fully 
exposed to sight. It is occasionally neces- 
sary to run a soil-pipe or other waste- 
pipe in a position where it ought to be 
concealed ; but I should, when I could, 
avoid such situations, and when possible 
I should resort to some frank decoration 
of the pipe rather than to its concealment 
behind a casing. 



SPE CIFIC A D VICE. 5 9 

Wherever pipes pass through floors in 
going from one story to another, I should 
make an absolutely tight blocking of the 
channel. As generally arranged, the 
soil-pipe and other pipes run through 
bungling openings In the floor concealed 
behind carpentry of one sort or another, 
and the pipes themselves are boxed in 
so that the whole system constitutes a 
free run-way for vermin, and a free chan- 
nel for the diffusion from cellar to garret, 
and between floors and behind partitions, 
of whatever foul air an ill-kept cellar and 
closet-fixtures may produce. 

The diffusion throughout steam-heated 
and ill-ventilated rooms of the floating 
results of hidden decomposition is appa- 
rent to a fresh nostril in many a " first-class 
house." There is no minor item connected 
with house-drainage that is productive of 
such an obvious improvement in the 
atmosphere of the rooms as the shutting 
off of this means of intercommunication. 



6o SPECIFIC ADVICE. 

I should use only extra-heavy soil-pipe, 
or pipe at least with extra-strong hubs, so 
that the lead calking can be driven so 
tightly home as to make leakage under 
any pressure absolutely impossible. 

I should try to avoid the placing of 
plumbing fixtures of any sort In the cellar 
of a house, unless they could so be ar- 
ranged as to deliver Into a soil-pipe or 
drain not concealed under the floor. In 
exceptional cases, where an underground 
drain Is necessary, I should not follow 
the regulations and lay a mason-work 
trench with a movable cover, so that ac- 
cess to the pipe could be gained at pleas- 
ure. I should have the pipe laid In an 
open trench, and so thoroughly calked 
that under a pressure equal to the height 
of one story not a drop should escape 
at any joint ; and then, a safe conduit 
being secured, I should inclose it In a 
concreting of the best cement, embracing 



SFE CIFIC A D VICE. 6 1 

it SO completely and so securely that If 
the Iron should rust out and be washed 
away, the cement Itself would constitute a 
safe channel. 

I should make It a chief aim to secure 
for all needed fixtures the greatest sim- 
plicity, and for all waste-pipes the greatest 
absence of complication. I should use 
sinks without grease-traps, bath-tubs 
without inaccessible overflows, wash- 
basins free as far as possible from fouling 
places, and water-closets without valves, 
connecting rods, or machinery. 

This suggestion Is a radical one, and 
it will fail of acceptance in many 
most respectable quarters. There can 
be, however, no question as to the 
propriety of expressing one's firm con- 
victions In the most distinct way. What 
I am endeavoring to convey is not 
the well-known average opinion of en- 
gineers and sanitarians — only my own 



62 SPECIFIC ADVICE. 

Opinion. This may be entirely wrong : 
but It is the outgrowth of the best 
thought that I have been able to give the 
subject, and It must be conceded that no 
harm will result to the health of the 
people If It Is followed out In practice. 

Note. — In connection with the instructions given in 
this chapter, attention is called to the note to Chapter 
XIII, concerning the Durham system of piping. 

It is still my opinion that grease-traps, of the kind gen- 
erally used, are a nuisance, and that their use should not 
be permitted. There is another sort of grease-trap now 
available, however, which obviates the deposits which it 
is the purpose of the old grease-trap to cause. This is 
the " Siphon Eduction " trap, made by Flushtank Com- 
pany, Richmond, Ind. Grease and other floating mat- 
ters are retained temporarily, and at regular intervals an 
automatic flushtank, which discharges a copious stream 
through a flushing rim, washes everything clean. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

THE SEWER-GAS QUESTION. 

THE main purpose of house-drainage, 
as we now understand it, is to 
remove all such wastes of domestic life 
as are suited for transportation in running 
water with the greatest completeness and 
with the greatest attainable safety. To 
secure this object, the drainage system 
must be so constructed as to carry away, 
completely and immediately, every thing 
that may be delivered into it ; to be con- 
stantly and generally well ventilated ; to 
be frequently and thoroughly flushed ; 
and to have each of its openings into the 
house guarded by a secure and reliable 
obstacle to the movement of air from the 



64 



THE SE WER- GAS QUES TION 



Interior of the drain or pipe Into the 
room. 

It Is no longer a question of '' sewer- 
gas." Wherever the offensive exhala- 
tions designated by this term exist, wher- 
ever the effluvium of putrid waste may be 
detected, there is inevitably defective 
arrangement, or defective workmanship, 
or both. 

It Is no longer to be considered the 
best policy to shut off sewer-gas from the 
house by confining it to the sewer. The 
true course should be to seek the seat of 
the evil and to remove Its cause. 

The foul air in a defective sewer or In 
a defective house-drain — and It more 
often originates in the latter — is Invarl- 
ably the result of the accumulation and 
retention of filth — its retention for a long 
enough time to allow it to enter Into 
putrid decomposition. There Is but one 
proper way to cure It ; that Is, to prevent 



THE SEWER-GAS QUESTION. 65 

the accumulation. Such removal is to be 
secured only by thorough flushing, either 
by a copious stream accompanying the 
discharge, or by frequent periodic wash- 
ings sufficient to sweep all deposits away. 
No flushing will prevent some sliming of 
the pipes, but good ventilation, will take 
care of this. 

All drains, soil-pipes, and waste-pipes 
should be absolutely tight, not only 
against the leakage of liquid, but against 
the leakage of air ; they should be so 
reached, in every part, by a flushing 
stream of one sort or another, that 
deposit and accumulation will be impos- 
sible ; they should be as thoroughly 
ventilated in every part as the safety of 
the water-seal will permit. The exterior 
drain, and ultimately the sewer into 
which it delivers, should have the same 
general characteristics, it being under- 
stood that the freest possible ventilation 



66 THE SEWER-GAS QUESTION. 

is to be given to both sewer and house- 
drain, by the admission of air from with- 
out and the delivery of air to the open 
sky, without the possibility of its entering 
the house at any point, in any manner, or 
at any time. 

All fixtures should be so trapped that 
the exclusion of the air of the drain 
should be assured, but at the same time 
in such a manner that at each use of 
every fixture all the filth that it deliv- 
ers shall be carried com.pletely away, 
the trap being immediately refilled with 
fresh water. 

Such are the leading sanitary require- 
ments of house-drainage. These being 
secured, it is a matter of little sanitary 
consequence whether the fixtures them- 
selves are cheap or costly, simple or 
elaborate, ornamented or plain. As, 
however, these appliances are devoted to 
the meaner uses of the household, good 



THE SEWER-GAS QUESTION. 67 

taste would indicate that their most 
appropriate '' elegance " is to be secured 
by making them and their belongings as 
simple as possible, and as inexpensive as 
the securing- of the best results will allow. 
They should be conspicuous, if at all, by 
their purity and cleanliness. 

Having thus set forth the general 
principles that should govern the con- 
struction of the drainage work of houses 
of all classes, we may next consider its 
details. 



CHAPTER IX. 

HOW THE SIMPLIFICATION OF PLUMBING 
WILL AFFECT THE PLUMBER. 

A CHIEF obstacle to the simplification 
of the plumbing works of a house 
arises from the mistaken commercial In- 
stinct of the plumber. It looks at first 
blush as though any thing tending to cut 
down the amount of their work must be 
injurious. 

So far as the present force of good 
plumbers is concerned, it seems to me that 
their business interest lies entirely in the 
other direction. New houses are being 
built with great rapidity and old houses 
are having their plumbing work re- 
arranged more and more thoroughly every 



SIMP LI PICA TION OP PLUMBING. 69 

year. Certainly the work is increasing 
much faster than is the number of plumb- 
ers qualified to do it properly. 

If the present profusion of plumbing 
appliances is adhered to, the only possible 
way in which construction and repair can 
be done will be by increasing the number 
of plumbers, faster, much faster, than 
material for the making of ^6'6><3f plumbers 
will present itself. 

Of course, the number of men engaged 
in this handicraft must increase constantly, 
but the more the amount of work in each 
house can be reduced the better and longer 
hold will the present force of good master 
and journeymen plumbers and the well- 
trained future addition to that force be 
able to do all of the good work offering 
within their reach. They are suffering 
now very greatly from competition with 
inferior and unprincipled men. The 
more rapidly the amount of work to 



70 SIMPLIFICATION OF PLUMBING. 

be done Increases, the more will this com- 
petition work to their disadvantage. 

If this suggestion is sound, the best 
course for the better plumbers to adopt 
in the interest of their own business will 
be to approve of and to recommend such a 
reduction of the amount of work in each 
case as will enable them to manage the 
growing number of cases. 

It is appropriate in this connection to 
offer a distinct recognition of the fact that 
practically, so far as the interests of the 
whole people are concerned, the plumbing 
fraternity are by far the most influential of 
all house sanitarians. Engineers, physi- 
cians and health officers accomplish much 
by their influence with individuals, and by 
the exercise of their professional and 
official functions ; but they reach after all 
only a limited section of the community. 
The plumber on the contrary makes his 
influence felt on every hand. Where an 



SIMPLIFICA TION OF PL UMBING. 7 1 

engineer or a sanitarian has to do with 
the drainage of one house, a plumber in 
good practice has practically the absolute 
control of a hundred houses. Ninety-nine 
men out of one hundred would receive the 
suggestion of a theoretical sanitarian in a 
very gingerly way, while they would 
accept without question the dictum of a 
practical plumber. 

Plumbers of the better class are fast 
coming to recognize the fact that the 
prosperity which this popular confidence 
brings to them, carries with it a serious 
public responsibility — a responsibility 
which, as a rule, they are endeavoring to 
meet in a spirit that is at least rare with 
men of other crafts. It is not universal 
with them. 

Another responsibility falls upon those 
who undertake to instruct architects, 
house-owners, and plumbers themselves 
as to the proper management of house- 



72 SIMPLIFICATION OF PLUMBING. 

drainage, i. e., the responsibility that 
attends an interference with plumbers' 
work. It is not only important to pre- 
scribe what should be done, but it is im- 
portant to do this in such a spirit, and 
with such clearness, as to carry persua- 
sion and conviction to the minds, and to 
engage the willing interest, of these ubi- 
quitous guardians of the health of the 
household. It is mainly because of this 
responsibility that I am anxious to assure 
those whose interests lie in the construc- 
tion of house-drainage works that the 
simplification of drainage systems which 
I so earnestly advise is in no respect 
inimical to the best business interests of 
the trade. 



CHAPTER X. 

THE MAIN LINE AND MAIN TRAPS. 

IN arranging the details of house-drain- 
age the main line Is always first to be 
considered. It begins at the sewer, or 
flush-tank, or — in barbarous Instances — 
at the cess-pool ; passes through the 
house by such a course as may be Indi- 
cated by a judicious compromise between 
directness and convenience, past the loca- 
tion of the highest fixture that Is to dis- 
charge Into It, and then passes out through 
the roof for free ventilation. 

The question of a main trap betw^een 
the house and a public sewer has been 
much discussed, and Is still determined 
by no rule. There should always be such 



74 THE MAIN LINE AND MAIN TRAPS. 

a trap between the house and a flush- 
tank or a cess-pool. I am incHned to the 
behef that there should not be such a trap 
ui the case of discharge into a sewer, 
unless it be especially foul. If it is only 
a great cess-pool, holding the accumu- 
lated deposits of a street or larger district, 
or if its interior atmosphere is at all com- 
parable in offensiveness with that of a 
cess-pool, then a trap will be desirable ; 
but if it has such an atmosphere as will 
admit of the entrance of workmen, and If 
its contents are carried forward in Its cur- 
rent with reasonable completeness, I in- 
cline to the opinion that, even If no other 
house connected with it aids in its venti- 
lation, it will be better that the single 
house under consideration should be con- 
nected without a trap. 

I have reached this conclusion slowly 
and in opposition to the opinion of many 
of the best engineers. The objections 



THE MAIN LIiYE AND MAIN TRAPS. 75 

ordinarily raised against the practice are 
that by it '' the sewer-gas is laid on " to 
the house ; that contagious diseases exist- 
ing in other houses connected with the 
sewer will communicate their infection 
directly to any house not so cut off ; and 
that, as a matter of common policy, one 
man alone should not ventilate a sewer 
that is used without ventilation by neigh- 
bors. 

There are two arguments against this, 
and they seem to be controlling ones, {a?) 
The purpose to be secured is the greatest 
practicable purity of the drains and pipes 
of the particular house, and, while it is 
true that a trap will shut off the air of the 
sewer, it is also true that the trap itself, 
unless the course of the drain is very 
steep and its flushing very copious, may 
not only form a seat of decomposing filth, 
but will so set back the flow as to cause 
a deposit of foul material for some dis- 



6 THE MAIN LINE AND MAIN TRAPS. 



tance along the drain on the house side 
of the trap. 

If the sewer is not extremely offen- 
sive — more offensive than a critical in- 
vestigation made a few years ago showed 
most sewers in New York city to be — 
there will be less stench coming from 
a current of air flowing from the sewer 
without a trap than will be devel- 
oped in the house-drain itself with a trap. 
The absence of the trap will secure a 
pretty constant and effective current of 
air from the sewer through to the top of 
the soil-pipe. With the trap, a suffi- 
cient current can be established by the 
use of a well-placed fresh-air inlet ; but 
the immediate seat of decomposition in 
and behind the trap will continue active. 
(^.) All the cry about sewer-gas being 
" laid on," and about the intercommuni- 
cation of diseases from one house to 
another by means of the sewer, is the out- 



THE MAIN LINE AND MAIN TRAPS. 77 

growth of a condition that Is now hardly 
tolerated, and that certainly Is not con- 
templated In this paper. In the older 
work, there was either no ventilation 
whatever to the drainage system of the 
house or It was very Inefficient. The water 
used, though perhaps not less in amount 
then than now, was not so used as to 
secure a good flushing effect, while the 
stability of traps was then little thought 
of. 

Pressure of any sort being brought to 
bear on the atmosphere of the sewer, foul 
air escaped into house-drains and found 
no other means of relief than by forcing 
traps or by working its way out at defec- 
tive joints. Under such circumstances, 
the argument in favor of the trap was a 
strong one. Now, house-drain and soil- 
pipe are tight, ventilation is very free and 
complete, the effect of a pressure on the 
air of the sewer is not to be feared, traps 



78 THE MAIN LINE AND MAIN TRAPS. 

are reliable, and, in the best work, joints 
are absolutely tight. 

Under such conditions the safeguard 
supposed to be furnished by the exterior 
trap is not needed — assuming always 
that the sewer Is a reasonably clean one. 
Its condition will always be improved 
by the ventilation furnished by the 
untrapped drain. 



CHAPTER XI. 

FRESH-AIR INLETS. 

IN the case of country houses, not dis- 
charging into sewers, the trap is a 
necessity. Wherever a trap is used, there 
must be on the house side of it an inlet for 
fresh air. There can be no real ventila- 
tion of the drainage system if it is open 
only at its top. A bottle can not be ven- 
tilated by removing its cork, nor will a 
chimney draw if it has no opening at the 
bottom. A copious inlet for fresh air, 
working in conjunction with a wide open- 
ing at the top of the soil-pipe, will insure 
a free movement throughout the whole 
system that will accomplish an adequate 
ventilation, not only of the main channel 



8o FRESH- AIR INLETS. ■ 

itself, but, by the diffusion of gases, of 
short branches connecting fixtures with it. 

Most of the directions given insanitary 
journals and books for the arrangement 
of fresh-air inlets, especially In cities, 
seem to have been made without due regard 
to their liability to become obstructed by 
rubbish, and especially to become entirely 
closed by accumulations of snow. Many 
such inlets In New York, at the edge of 
the pavement or at the face of the curb, 
are sometimes blocked for days together 
in bad winter weather. Becoming ob- 
structed from any cause, their efficiency 
stops, and for the time being the security 
that they should afford is withdrawn. 

There is really no good reason for 
placing this opening at a distance from 
the house. I have never known annoy- 
ance resulting from the Inlet pipe being 
brought out at the face of the foundation 
wall, preferably, of course, not too near 



FRESH-AIR INLETS. S'x 

to windows and doors. With well-flushed 
pipes, as already said, the constant though 
often slow movement of air throucrh them 
so reduces the offensiveness, which a few 
years since was thought to be inevitable, 
that, although there might be a slight 
outward puff when closets or baths are 
discharged, no annoyance results. 



CHAPTER XII. 

MATERIAL AND CONSTRUCTION. 

WHETHER the soil-pipe passes 
through or under the foundation 
of the house, unless the wall be old 
enough for all dancrer of settlement to 
have passed, it should be carried through 
an arched opening to prevent its dis- 
turbance if settlement does occur. In 
any case, the iron pipe should be con- 
tinued for nearly or quite a full length 
(five feet) outside of the foundation wall. 
It may be continued further with advan- 
taore. Althouorh thus laid in the crround 
and used as a drain, iron pipe is not, like 
earthenware pipe, imperishable ; still the 
greater certainty of tightness, and correct 



A/ A TERIA L A ND CONS TR UC 7 ION. 83 

grading, if due only to the better class of 
workmen by whom it is done, is a strong 
argument in its favor. After reaching 
solid ground that has not been disturbed 
in excavating for the foundation, a care- 
fully laid and rigidly inspected earthen- 
ware drain is to be preferred. 

After the drain passes inside of the 
foundation wall it is better, where it is 
not necessary to connect with fixtures in 
the cellar, that it should be carried in full 
sight, along the face of the cellar wall or 
suspended from the floor-beams, to the 
point where it is to turn up as a vertical 
soil-pipe. This is advisable because here 
as much as any where else in the house, 
it is important to be able to inspect the 
joints, and to know always the condition 
of the work. 

If, however, it should be necessary to 
make connection with a water-closet or 
other fixture in the cellar, it is better that 



84 MATERIAL AND CONSTRUCTION. 

the main channel should run under the 
floor to or near the location of such fix- 
ture, in order that all or nearly all of its 
length may constitute a part of the main 
line, thoroughly flushed and thoroughly 
ventilated, like the rest of the system. 

If there are several vertical soil-pipes, 
it will suffice, of course. If one of them 
is carried down for the cellar connection, 
and the others can be carried too^ether 
above ground and connected with the 
main line before leavinor the house. A 
branch only ten or twelve feet long, run- 
ning to a servants' closet In the cellar, 
even if provided with adequate upward 
ventilation, is not likely to keep In nearly 
so good condition as it would if carrying 
also the discharge of closets and baths 
above. 

Whenever It becomes necessary to lay 
the drain under the cellar floor, I should not 
counsel the following of the usual recom- 



• MATERIAL AND CONSTRUCTION. 85 

mendation to lay an iron pipe in a mason- 
work trench, with a cover that may be 
removed for inspection. It should be 
protected as hereinbefore described. 



CHAPTER XIII. 



THE SOIL-PIPE. 



IT is a generally accepted rule, and a 
good one where space suffices, to use 
no short turns — technically, '' T branches " 
and ''quarter bends." Two one-eighth 
bends, or a Y branch and a single one- 
eighth bend, give a more gradual and 
therefore better change of direction. So, 
in the attachment of water-closets to 
vertical soil-pipes, it is usual and better to 
make the connection w^ith Y branches. 
Where space does not suffice, however, a 
half Y answers a sufficiently good pur- 
pose, and even a T branch (right angle) 
is less objectionable than it was when 



THE SOIL-PIPE. . 87 

flushing was less copious than now. The 
soil-pipe throughout its whole length, 
horizontal as well as vertical, should be 
so secured with hangers and clamps or 
hooks and with supporting posts that it 
will be rigidly fixed in its position. 

From the beginning of the work, every 
joint should be made with a view to being 
tested under hydraulic pressure. If the 
workman has this in view, the test will 
generally discover few leaks. As ordi- 
narily made, especially where the whole 
circumference of the pipe is not easily 
accessible to the calkinor tool, a test will 
almost invariably disclose serious leakage. 

In every case the test should be made, 
and every semblance of a leak should be 
calked until thoroughly tight under pres- 
sure. In making this test, the simplest 
way is to close all openings into the pipe 
with disks of india-rubber compressed 
between two plates of iron forced together 



88 THE SOIL-PIPE. 

with a screw. Such plugs can be fastened 
so tightly as to hold a head of fifty feet. 
There is no special advantage, however, in 
applying this force ; for if joints are to 
leak at all, they will leak usually under a 
head of a few inches, and always under a 
head of a few feet. It is generally most 
convenient to test the vertical pipes story 
by story, the plugs being inserted through 
the water-closet branches. 

Another satisfactory test which maybe 
applied after all fixtures are attached, is 
made with an air-pump and pressure- 
gauge, such as gas-fitters use. If the 
gauge stands firm even under a slight 
pressure for an hour together, the work 
may be accepted as tight. The principal 
drawback is that, if the joints are not 
tight, it is much more difificult to locate a 
slight leak than when the water test is 
used. 

I think it may be accepted as a well- 



THE SOIL-PIPE. 8q 

grounded rule that no prudent owner 
should receive and pay for his plumbing 
work until all of the iron waste-pipe has 
been tested, by one or the other of these 
methods, under the personal observation 
of the architect or his plumbing expert. 
There is probably no occasion to fear 
that work once made tight w^ill develop 
leaks for many years, the tendency to rust 
after a time, even with tar-coated or 
enameled pipe, being rather to close such 
slight leaks as may exist. 

The fear has sometimes been felt that 
sand-holes and slight imperfections in 
cast-iron soil-pipe may lead to the per- 
manent injury of the work. Ordinarily, 
this is not a real danger. Where pipes 
have been tested before erection by being 
filled with water in single lengths and 
rejected because of slight leaks, it has 
been found that a few hours later such 
leaks have become entirely closed with 



90 THE SOIL-PIPE. 

rust. Doubtless a rust closure is a per- 
manent one. 

The use of cast-iron for soil-pipe and 
minor waste-pipes is still almost univer- 
sal. They are jointed with lead, which 
should be of sufficient amount to fill 
the joint entirely full at a single pour- 
ing. This lead is then tightly driven 
home with a steel caulking iron, and so 
packed closely against the walls of the 
pipes. 

There are two grades of soil-pipe 
knowm to the trade, ''common" and 
'' extra-heavy." If common pipe has suf- 
ficiently strong hubs to stand heavy calk- 
ing, and if the outer and inner circtunfer' 
cnces are concentric, there is no reason 
why it may not be trusted for very long 
service ; but it is difficult to maintain the 
core in a perfectly concentric position, 
and even in the best pipe there is gener- 
ally a slight difference of thickness 



THE SOIL-PIPE. 91 

between one side and another. A very 
slight difference is a serious matter in 
common pipe. In extra-heavv pipe, un- 
less the eccentricity is very obvious, even 
the thinner portion will be thick enough 
for safety. This thicker pipe, however, 
is sometimes weakened by air bubbles in 
the mass. To detect these, the pipe 
should be tested by sharp hammering 
over its whole surface. 

In ordinary work in private houses, a 
diameter of four inches has been adopted 
as sufficient for the soil-pipe. So far as 
the mere water-way is concerned, this 
diameter is ample, even when roof water 
is admitted from very large houses. 
Indeed, for most cases a diameter of 
three inches will furnish a sufficient 
water-way ; then, again, the smaller the 
pipe the more thoroughly it is flushed by 
the stream discharo^ed through it. 

There is, however, another considera- 



92 THE SOIL-PIPE. 

tlon that is Important. The siphonic 
action, or suction, produced upon lateral 
branches by the discharge of water 
through the main shaft, is in inverse pro- 
portion to the diameter of the pipe. 
The sudden discharge of a water-closet 
using three or four gallons of water 
through the three-inch soil-pipe might, 
under favorable circumstances, produce 
a considerable vacuum in the branches. 
The same volume flowing through a 
four-inch pipe would have a less effect, 
and through a five-inch pipe still less. 
Practically, where there are no fixtures 
higher than the fourth story, and where 
the admission of air from the top of 
the soil-pipe Is very free, four Inches 
may generally be regarded as a safe size.' 

Note. — For a long time what is known as tlie Durham 
system of soil and waste piping was too imperfect in its 
details to satisfy the requirements of the best work. 

Mr. Durham has now, however, greatly improved the 



THE SOIL-PIPE. 93 

castings used for jointing liis pipes ; has substituted steel 
for wrought iron ; and has perfected his system in all its 
details. It is now much the best method of piping, and, 
especially as it is not very much more costly, it ought to 
supplant the use of cast-iron pipes in all but the cheaper 
classes of plumbing. 

The whole work is thoroughly galvanized, inside and 
out, all the joints are screwed together with deep threads, 
and, aside from the better practical result, it has a much 
better appearance, which is not a small matter now that 
it is the rule to leave all the piping exposed to view. As 
a rule, the single pipes are long enough to reach from 
floor to ceiling, and the joints and branches are out of 
sight under the floor. 

In the reconstruction of the plumbing of the United 
States Capitol at Washington, in 1893, I used the Dur- 
ham system exclusively. There was over a mile and a 
half (8582 feet) of piping, ranging from 8-inch to 2-inch, 
The work was necessarily very complicated, and there were 
no fewer than 4742 joints. Every part of the system was 
tested under an air pressure of 10 pounds per square 
inch, and every joint was screwed up until it was abso- 
lutely tight ; 2008 feet of the pipe (from 3 inches to 5 
inches diameter) is of brass, iron-pipe thickness, and 1422 
feet of this — all that is in sight — is nickel-plated. The 
remaining pipe, in the cellar, is of heavy galvanized steel. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

VENTILATING COWLS ON SOIL-PIPES. 

THE upward extension of soil-pipe for 
complete ventilation is a matter of 
much importance, and one that has been 
considerably bedeviled by invention. 
Experiments instituted to demonstrate 
the utility of different caps or ventila- 
ting cowls have not yet been carried to a 
complete scientific result ; but they have 
sufficed to establish two important points. 
One is, that every ventilating cowl of 
whatever kind, and of whatever effective- 
ness during positive winds — when no 
cowl is needed — is invariably an obstruc- 
tor of the movement of air during calms 
or under light winds. It is known that 



VENTILA TING CO WLS IN SOII-PIPES. 95 




every deviation from the straight line 

obstructs the current by In- 

creaslnor the friction. There- 

fore, the cap or bend or cowl, 

one or another of which Is 

almost always used, Is of no 

real utility In a high wind, 

and Is an absolute obstructor 

during light winds and calms. 

The best result will always ^ 
be obtained by running the 
soil-pipe straight up to a 
certain elevation above the 
roof — more or less according 
to the exposure — and leaving 
it entirely open at the top. 
To prevent Intentional or 
accidental introduction of ob- 
structing objects. It is a good 
practice to Insert, and to 
secure, Into the open mouth 
the ordinary spherical wire-basket that 




FIG. 3. — THE TOP 
FINISH OF A SOIL- 
PIPE. 



96 VENTILATING COWLS IN SOIL-PIPES. 

IS used to keep leaves from obstruct- 
ing the outlets of roof gutters. 

The other point is, that a universally 
effective increase of the movement of air 
is secured by increasing the diameter of 
the pipe at its upper end. Theoretic- 
ally, the lower down the enlargement 
begins, and the greater it becomes at the 
top, the better will be the current pro- 
duced. Practically, it seems to suffice to 
increase the diameter of the single 
upper length of pipe. This is most con- 
veniently done by using an '' increaser," 
from four inches to six inches, just under 
the roof, and to a set length of six-inch 
pipe at the top. 

The owner and the architect, and all 
who are interested in securing good work, 
should bear constantly in mind the 
importance of making this main channel 
for ventilation and for drainage abso- 
lutely and permanently good from bot- 



VENTILA TING CO WLS IN SOIL-PIPES. 97 

torn to top. This being assured and 
tested, the various fixtures or plumbing 
appliances may be connected with its 
branches. 



CHAPTER XV. 

TRAPS AND TRAP VENTILATION. 

TRAPS, constituting one of the most 
essential elements of plumbing work, 
have for some time past occupied the care- 
ful attention of all who are interested in 
the improvement of house-drainage. Few 
who have applied their ingenuity to the 
subject have failed to invent and patent 
a '' sewer-gas " trap. I took out a patent 
for a trap of this sort myself some years 
ago — probably one of the least successful 
of the whole list. The best of the efforts 
of others, thus far, have been only meas- 
urably successful. I am still using one 
or two of them in my own work, because 
they are passably good, and because 



TRAPS AND TRAP VENTILA TION. 99 

nothing else has offered that seemed bet- 
ter. The successful accomplishment of 
the object In view offers probably the 
most hopeful field to which sanitary Inven- 
tors can now turn their attention. 

Devices Intended to meet existing diffi- 
culties have not all been confined to the 
form and construction of the trap Itself. 
Much the most widely recommended and 
successfully enforced effort to meet the 
difficulty has been to supply what Is known 
as the '' back ventilation " of traps. Hav- 
ing known of the early failure of this 
device, before It was generally recom- 
mended to the public and taken up In the 
compulsory regulations of health boards, 
and having carefully watched Its develop- 
ment, I have never been able to look 
upon It with favor. In some cases It 
does good, but I believe that on the 
zuhole It does more harm. 

Not only as confirming my own view, 



ICO TRAPS AND TRAP VENTILATION, 

but as an illustration of very thorough 
and careful experimental work, attention 
may properly be called to an investigation 
carried on for the City Board of Health 
of Boston, by J. Pickering Putnam, Esq., 
an architect of that city. These investi- 
gations have been set forth quite fully in 
illustrated communications to the "Ameri- 
can Architect," which papers certainly 
mark a very important step forward in 
sanitary literature. The deductions to 
be drawn from these investigations are 
these : 

While a sufficient vent-hole at the 
crown of a trap will prevent its contents 
from being withdrawn by siphonage (suc- 
tion), insufficiency in such an opening, 
resulting from whatever cause, defeats the 
purpose for which it was made. Insuffi- 
ciency may be due to several things. (^.) 
The opening may originally be made too 
small. (^.) It may, and very often does, 



TRAPS AND TRAP VENTILATION. lOl 

become reduced in size, or entirely closed 
by the accumulation of foul matter thrown 
into it during the use of the trap. (^.) 
As its efficiency is due entirely to the ad- 
mission of air fast enough to supply- the 
demand for air to fill the vacuum caused 
by water flowing through some portion of 
the pipe beyond the trap, it is not only a 
question of having an opening large 
enough to admit the air, but of having an 
adequate current led freely to the open- 
ing. 

As the opening is into a portion of the 
drainage system that is unprotected by a 
trap, it can not, of course, communicate 
with the interior atmosphere of the house ; 
it must be connected by a pipe either with 
the open air outside of the house, or with 
the air of the upper part of the soil-pipe, 
above all fixtures. The ability of this pipe 
to transmit air in the volume required de- 
pends on its size and on its directness. 



102 TRAPS AND TRAP VENTILA TION. 

A one-inch pipe, one foot long, for exam- 
ple, may admit air fast enough, while a 
longer pipe of the same diameter, or a 
smaller pipe of the same length, would 
not do so. 

One or other of the defects above indi- 
cated may very easily defeat the object, 
and, in so far as the opening may be 
decreased by the accumulation of waste 
matters, the object, which is fully secured 
while the work is new, may be perma- 
nently defeated by a condition that occurs 
after a little use. What seemed originally 
to be adequate security may become un- 
trustworthy in time. 

Then, again, the trap to which such 
back ventilation is applied depends for 
its efficiency on the permanence of its 
water-seal. A water-seal which has no 
other exposure to the air than it gets un- 
der ordinary circumstances, will not be so 
reduced by evaporation as to lose its value 



TRAPS AND TRAP VENTILATION. 103 

for a considerable period ; but with back 
ventilation, a current of air is established 
through the pipe in the immediate vicinity 
of the trap, and evaporation becomes 
more rapid, destroying the seal by remov- 
ing the water, in a very short time. It 
was an unsealing due to evaporation that 
first caused me to discard the method. I 
believe, most firmly, that when the system 
of back ventilation, as now practiced, is 
applied to all the traps of a house, the 
destruction of the seal, by evaporation, 
will be much more to be feared than it 
would be in the same set of traps by 
siphonage only, if not vented. 

Traps are also frequently emptied of 
their water by capillary attraction. When 
a rag, a bit of string, a matting of hair, 
or any other porous substance having 
one end immersed in the trap, has the 
other end extending over the bend and 
leading into the discharge pipe, traps 



104 TRA PSA ND TRA P VEN TIL A TION. 

having a seal of only the ordinary depth 
may be emptied In a short time by this 
action alone. In other cases, and even 
where the traps are considerably deeper, 
the capillary material, by Increasing the 
evaporating surface, greatly Increases the 
liability to evaporation In the presence of 
the current of air produced by the vent- 
ing-plpe. While, therefore, this capillary 
action Is not an Infrequent source of the 
failure of a trap which Is not ventilated, 
Its effect Is much more serious when the 
trap Is ventilated. 

Mr. Putnam's experiments were con- 
ducted In logical order. He first demon- 
strated that the air rushing through the 
trap to supply a vacuum caused by a 
flow In the piping beyond carries the 
water with It as a matter of course. 
Some of this water, striking against the 
walls of the trap. Is thrown back to Its 
original position, so that the whole vol- 



TRAPS AND TRAP VENTILATION. 105 

ume of sealing-water is rarely removed 
with a single motion, whatever the form 
of the trap. However, he found that, 
sooner or later, under a sufficiently con- 
tinued movement of air, the water, 
even in a deep trap, might be so with- 
drawn as to break the seal permanently. 
The time required for this depends very 
much upon the number of surfaces of 
the wall of the trap tending to throw the 
water back into it. It was found that, of 
the common traps, the ordinary *' pot " 
or '' bottle" trap offered the greatest ob- 
stacle to siphonage. It was assumed that 
" the severest test for siphonage to which 
a trap could possibly be subjected in 
practice would be that which would be 
sufficient to siphon out an eight-inch pot- 
trap or a ventilated S trap constructed in 
the usual manner." 

The apparatus used was strong enough 
to destroy in one second the seal of a 



io6 TRAPS AND TRAP VENTILATION. 

one and one-quarter inch S trap, with 
a one and one-quarter inch vent-opening 
at the crown, having a one and one-quar- 
ter inch smooth lead pipe, sixteen feet 
long, connected with it ; and to siphon out 
an unventilated pot-trap eight inches in 
diameter, having a seal four inches deep. 
It was shown by this apparatus that a re- 
duction of diameter of the vent-pipe, or 
an increase in its length, lessened the 
stability of the trap. It made a marked 
difference whether the pipe was straight 
or was bent into a coil three feet in di- 
ameter. It would seem from the descrip- 
tion that the vent-opening was as large, 
and the vent-pipe described above as 
large, as short, and as straight, as would 
ordinarily be found in practice ; and it 
was shown that the seal was, in nearly 
every case, easily destroyed. 

The experiments demonstrated that 
none of the ordinary traps can withstand 



TRAPS AND TRAP VENTILATION. 



107 




,^- ' ■■• 'A 




FIG. 4. — THE CROOKS AND ANGLES OF TRAP-VENT PIPES. 

Note. — The shaded pipes are the vent pipes. The arrows show the direction of the 
air current as moving to prevent siphonage. 
D. Wash-bowl, 



A. Water-closet. B. Bath. C. Bidet. 



io8 TRAPS AND TRAP VENTILATION. 

a not unusual siphonic action, even with 
what would be considered adequate ven- 
tilation. These experiments were repeated 
in a great variety of ways with the same 
general result. 

If the reader will examine the tortuous 
course of the various pipes shown in the 
accompanying illustration (Fig. 4) of 
actual work, or in any such illustration to 
be found in sanitary journals, he will see 
that the difference between a straight line 
and a coil three feet in diameter is as noth- 
ing compared with what constantly occurs 
in practice where the vent-pipes turn in 
and out and up and down, and are inter- 
rupted by frequent branches to such an 
extent as to increase very greatly, indeed, 
the difficulty of the rapid passage of air 
through them. I have seen a single 
vent-pipe, having three branches on each 
of two upper floors, carried down by an 
irregular course with sharp turns to the 



TRAPS AND TRAP VENTILATION. 109 

traps of a bath, a sitz-bath, a bidet, a 
wash-stand, and a water-closet on the 
floor below. 

Aside from this serious objection, it is 
not every plumber who is able to keep his 
head in carrying out such complicated 
work, and we frequently see a distinct 
''by-pass" leading from the drain directly 
into the apartment. 

In tests of capillary action, the follow- 
ing results were obtained : Strips of hair- 
felt, closely resembling the matted accu- 
mulation of short hairs which forms so 
large a proportion of deposit in traps and 
pipes, were used, having one end immersed 
in the water of the trap and the other 
hanging over the bend. Other materials 
were similarly used. The result of the 
experiments, as affecting the question of 
ventilation, is thus set forth : 

'' To test the loss by capillary attrac- 
tion on ventilated S traps, as compared 



no TRAPS AND TRAP VENTILATION, 

with the loss on the same where unventi- 
lated, an S trap having a seal of four and 
five-eighths Inches was arranged as before 
with jute half filling the trap. With the 
trap attached to a waste-pipe, and con- 
nected with the drain In the ordinary 
manner, but unventllated, the loss by 
capillary attraction was as follows : * In 
the first five minutes, one-half Inch ; In 
the first forty-five minutes, one Inch ; In 
twenty-four hours, three Inches ; In three 
days, three and one-quarter Inches ; In 
four days, three and three-eighths, Inches. 
Thereafter no perceptible change took 
place. It made no perceptible difference 
whether the basin side of the trap was 
opened or closed, showing that evapora- 
tion in an unventllated trap is practi- 
cally almost Imperceptible. 



* A part of this was probably due to the absorption of the 
water by the fibers of the jute. — G. E. W., Jr. 



TRAPS AND TRAP VENTILATION. Ill 

The experiment was then repeated on 
the same trap ventilated at the crown into 
a cold flue, with the following result : In 
one hour, one and one-eighth inch had 
been removed ; in five hours, one and 
seven-eighths inch ; in twenty-two hours, 
two and a half inches ; in two days, three 
and one-quarter inches ; in three days, 
three and a half inches ; in four days, three 
and three-quarters inches ; in five days, 
four inches. Thus the loss continued at 
the rate of about one-quarter inch a day by 
evaporation, after the outer end of the 
jute mass had entirely dried up. This 
evaporation was nearly double what it 
would have been had it not been assisted 
by the capillaiy attraction. From this 
we see that ventilation greatly increases 
the danger arising from capillary attrac- 
tion, often rendering the latter dangerous 
in cases where, without ventilation, the 
seal would not have been broken. 



112 TRAPS AND TRAP VENTILATION. 

Note. — My experience and observation during the 
years that have passed since the foregoing was first pub- 
lished, have fully confirmed my earlier opinion that the 
back ventilation of traps does, on the w^hole, more harm 
than good. 

In any case, there is no longer any excuse for requiring 
it, and the sooner boards of health cease to require it, the 
better it will be for all concerned — except, perhaps, the 
plumber. 

There are now perfectly safe anti-siphon traps in the 
market, and in the very rare cases where these cannot be 
used, the McClellan mercury-seal air inlet answers every 
purpose. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

NON-SIPHONIC TRAPS. 

AS an incidental result of his experi- 
ments on siphonage, Mr. Putnam, by 
gradual stages, arrived at the invention of 
a trap which seems to be a practical one, 
and which, subjected to tests that were 
sufficient to break the seal of any ordinary 
trap even with fair back-ventilation, main- 
tained its seal undisturbed without beinor 

o 

ventilated. The theory followed is this : 
Siphonage is due to the rapid movement 
through the trap of air driven in by 
atmospheric pressure, to fill the partial 
vacuum formed by the withdrawal of air 
from the pipe beyond the trap by the 
inductive effect of flowing water ; the first 



114 NON-SIPHONIC TRAPS. 

tendency of the current thus produced is 
to carry the sealing-water with it. 

In a perfectly smooth curved trap the 
removal of the water may under strong 
suction be complete and almost instan- 
taneous ; In traps of irregular form, where 
the water in its course strikes against the 
wall of the trap, it is thrown back or de- 
flected from its course ; when so thrown 
back a portion of the water is still carried 
on by the current of air, but another 
portion falls away from the current and 
resumes its position in the trap. If a suf- 
ficient number of deflecting surfaces are 
presented in the course of the current of 
air, the whole of the water, after a certain 
portion of the seal has been removed, is 
retained, and the complete unsealing of 
the trap can not occur. 

Mr. Putnam's trap, the form of which 
is illustrated herewith, stands, in its normal 
condition, almost entirely full of water. 



NON-SIPHONIC TRAPS. US 

Under strong siphonic action about one- 
half of this water follows the air toward 
the drain ; this amount being removed, 
the deflecting surfaces of that portion of 
the apparatus thus emptied suffice to rob 





FIG. 5. — PUTNAM S TRAP 

The complete trap is shown at a. Its different parts are shown in the 
cuts b, c. and d. The parts c and d may easily be removed for cleansing 
without the aid of a plumber. 

the air-current of its spray, and under no 
test that has yet been applied, with an 
open-topped soil-pipe, can the seal be 
broken. The interior of the trap is well 
exposed to view, and the arrangement 
for cleaning in case of need is simple. 
The trouble of an occasional unscrewing 



Ii6 NON-SIPHONIC TRAPS. 

of the glass cap to remove an obstruc- 
tion would be a very small price to pay 
for the absolute security which Mr. Putnam 
seems to have achieved.* 

This trap, or something like it, may 
probably come into universal use for 
wash-stands, baths, and laundry-tubs, — 
for urinals, also, where separate urinals 
are used. For water-closets it cannot 
take the place of the exposed trap of 
which the bowl constitutes one arm. For 
kitchen and pantry sinks I consider my 
own device better. 

I have been using for some years past 
one form or other of mechanical trap, 
usually Bower's or Cudell's. They seemed 
to be the best heretofore available, but 
they have never been entirely satisfactory. 

* Since the above was written, I have tested Mr. Putnam's 
trap, finding it effective in withstanding siphonage, and sub- 
stantially self-cleansing. It seems to me the best trap that I 
have seen. It is entirely and permanently effective. 



NON-SIPHONIC TRAPS. 117 

Continued experience with the Putnam 
trap has shown it to be much better than 
either of them. 

Another excellent non-siphoning trap 
is the ** Puro," made by The Dececo 
Co., of Boston. It has a smooth in- 
terior of easy curves, without angles 
or corners lying outside of the line 
of current, all parts of which are sub- 
ject to the direct scouring action of the 
flow. The outlet side of the trap is en- 
larged so that it will hold enough water 
to afford an efficient seal after air has 
been drawn through the trap, and the 
tendency of this enlargement to retard 
tlie flow and prevent the effectual scour- 
ing of tlie walls is overcome by the use 
of a semi-circular deflector, so formed and 
situated as to serve a three-fold purpose : 
(i) It divides the flow and, while leaving 
enough to keep the bottom of the trap 
scoured by Its centrifugal force, it diverts 



Ii8 NON-SIPHONIC TRAPS. 

the rest obliquely toward those parts 
which, without it, would be unscoured 
because away from the flow line ; (2) it 
prevents a retardation of the flow by 
contracting the waterway at the point of 




FIG. 6. 



greatest head ; and (3) by breaking up 
the mass of water In the trap, it enables 
incoming air to reach the crown more 
quickly than It could if it had to struggle 
up through a solid body of w^ater, thus 
saving to the trap a large amount of 
sealing water. This deflector, it will be 



NON-SIPHONIC TRAPS. II*^ 

noted from the cut, Is not presented at 
right angles to the line of flow, but so 
obtusely as to offer but the slightest 
resistance. It cannot be regarded as an 
obstruction — it Is rather a guide. As 
made. It Is a component part of the trap. 
In fact, the Puro trap, of whatever form 
and whether of brass or lead, consists of 
a single casting, excepting, of course, the 
trap-screw. The absence of separable 
parts makes this trap very durable. 

Whether compelled by local law to ven- 
tilate traps or not, I should not depend on 
ventilation, In the conviction that the sim- 
ple S trap, as ordinarily constructed and as 
ordinarily ventilated, is totally unreliable. 

If compelled by law to construct the 
prescribed '' back-ventilation " I should be 
tempted, after its completion, to make the 
system inoperative by closing the main 
ventilation pipe at some point near its 
upper end. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

PLUMBING APPLIANCES. 

CONCERNING patented apparatus, it 
is proper for me to explain the fact 
that in the following pages, among other 
things, I set forth somewhat in detail in- 
ventions of my own, which are patented, 
and by the sale of which I should profit. 
Such a course is naturally open to criti- 
cism, and such a position is always one of 
embarrassment. It is the usual course 
to describe the various appliances in com- 
mon use, mentioning one's own only inci- 
dentally, and this would doubtless be 
thought by many persons to be the proper 
one for me to pursue. 



PLUMBING APPLIANCES. 12 1 

It seems to me on reflection, however, 
that the only justification for the writing 
of this book is to communicate to the 
pubHc the best advice I have to offer. 

My attention has been given for many 
years to details of house-drainage as a 
matter of business, not of philanthropy. 
I have had occasion to study closely, and 
to adopt and discard, one after another, 
a long series of plumbing appliances — 
things that have come up and gone down 
in the rapidly Improving art which twenty 
years ago was an extremely crude one, 
and in which perfection has not yet been 
attained in all details. 

I might describe this succession of Im- 
provements, and indicate the quality, 
promise, and defect of each. Such infor- 
mation may be found, by those who desire 
It, very well set forth In the rather copi- 
ous modern literature of the subject. The 
space at my disposal here would hardly 



12 2 PL UMBING A PPIIA NCES. 

suffice for a bare cataloguing of plumb- 
ing Improvements. 

My own devices were in no case in- 
vented with a view to securing a valuable 
patent, nor for any other purpose than to 
improve my own professional practice. 
The few of these devices which have ap- 
proved themselves to my later judgment, 
and which I am now introducing in my 
work, I have patented to secure an Inci- 
dental commercial advantage. I shall 
therefore describe them without hesita- 
tion and without further comment, treat- 
ing them exactly as I treat such of the 
Inventions of others as I believe to be 
good. I shall trust to the good sense of 
the reader not to misunderstand my mo- 
tive. 

Special appliances for carrying out the 
plumber's art In the drainage of houses 
are to be numbered by hundreds. Inven- 
tion has taken advantage of a growing 



PL UMBTNG APPLIANCES. 1 23 

demand for the attainment of additional 
security against the Invasion of draln-air, 
and has literally rim wild. *' Sewer-gas " 
has been made to do full duty as a cause 
of public alarm. The shops and the cat- 
alogues and the professional papers and 
books are full of an embarrassing variety 
of all manner of devices. 

Many of these Inventions are great 
Improvements on their predecessors, but 
many are their predecessors under new 
names and with new complications. Few 
of them have been made with regard for 
what seems to be the most imperative 
need of the work — simplicity. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 



SIMPLICITY. 



WE should especially seek the greatest 
possible simplicity, not only in 
detail but in oreneral scheme. While the 
market offers a separate vessel for each 
possible separate use, the wisest course 
seems to be to reduce the number of ves- 
sels and to concentrate the various uses 
as much as may be. For example, I 
should, whenever possible, avoid the need 
for urinals, slop-sinks, and hoppers, by 
constructing the water-closet in such a 
manner as to supply all of these demands 
in a convenient and acceptable way, thus 
securing, incidentally, the most frequent 



SIMPLICITY. 125 

change of Its trapping-water and the most 
frequent flushing of its outlet. 

The urinal Is almost Invariably the 
most odorous vessel in the house. The 
slop-hopper is generally a receptacle for 
rags and rubbish, in a dark, out-of-the- 
way, uninspected closet ; and the sink for 
drawing water is, in less degree, open to 
similar objection. 

With a self-closing faucet for drawing 
water, there need be provided for the 
protection of the ceiling below only such 
simple means of outlet — like a safe-pipe 
opening through the ceiling of the base- 
ment or over a sink or a water-closet cis- 
tern — as will carry the slight drip that 
may come from an accidental leak. Or- 
dinarily there Is no serious objection to 
arranging to draw water through the 
bath-cock, if this Is placed, as it should be, 
at the top of the tub. 

Objections to this concentration of 



126 SIMPLICITY. 

uses, and to the abandonment of the pro- 
vision of a separate vessel for each sep- 
arate use, are confined mainly to trade 
journals, published in the interest of 
manufacturers and plumbers whose profits, 
it is thought, might be affected by the 
reduction. Their argument is that ''cost 
is secondary to ample convenience." 

While it is important to avoid unneces- 
sary cost, the economical argument is the 
least of all the reasons for what is here 
proposed. The real and controlling argu- 
ment is based on the great advantage of 
having the fewest possible points requir- 
ing inspection and care and to secure the 
most frequent possible use of every Inlet 
into the drainage system. Reasonable 
convenience being always kept in view, 
three water-closets In an ordinary house 
are much better than half a dozen ; and 
the same principle holds throughout the 
whole range of plumbing appliances. 



CHAPTER XIX. 



WASH-STANDS. 



STATIONARY wash-stands, where 
they should be used at all — in bath- 
rooms and lavatories mainly — should, like 
all other fixtures of the kind, have the space 
under the slab fully exposed to view, so 
that the trap and all pipes may be seen 
at all times, and so that neither by acci- 
dent nor by stealth may there be created 
the hidden untidy condition which is al- 
most universal with the tight, un ventilated, 
inclosed spaces once so generally used. 

The basin itself, as now constructed, has 
a hidden overflow which it is very difficult, 
if not impossible, to cleanse, and it has 
generally either a plug and chain to close 



128 WASH-STANDS. 

its outlet, or a side plug- operated by a 
knob above the slab. Both of these are 
wholly objectionable. The links of the 
chain and the rinorand attachments of the 
plug become fouled with soapy matters, 
and it is difficult to cleanse them. Prac- 
tically, they are generally nasty. 

To shake a filthy chain in a basin of 
clear water would be a very untidy pre- 
liminary to ablution. This is substantially 
what we do when we let water run with 
some force directly into a basin in which 
a dirty chain is hanging. 

The side plug seems to be much nicer ; 
it is really less nice. There is a befouled 
waste-pipe leading from the outlet to the 
plug, in communication with a slime-coated 
overflow channel rising above the plug. 
This pipe it is practically impossible to 
cleanse. Its filth is constantly undergoing 
decomposition. Whenever the bowl is 
emptied It becomes filled with air ; when 



WA SH-STANDS. I 29 

the plug is closed and the bowl is filled, 
this air is driven in bubbles with some 
violence into the bowl. Not infrequently 
flakes of the sliming matter come with it. 

Note. — There has now come into quite general use a 
" standing- overflow " for the wash-basin, which obviates 
these old objections. 

The bowl is made to slope, not toward the center, but 
toward the back, at a point under the edge of the slab. 
The outlet is placed here, and it is plugged with a short 
pipe, serving also as an overflow. It is raised and low- 
ered by a simple lever above the slab, and it may be 
removed for cleansing. It is a great improvement on all 
that preceded it. 

A new waste — the " Hale," opening at the center of 
the bowl, after the old manner— is actuated by a lever 
working from below, so that the basin remains smooth 
and unobstructed. The overflow is through the side of 
the bowl near the top, but it is freed from the objection 
set forth in Chapter XXII by the fact that the discharge 
does not set back into the overflow channel, having a 
tendency, rather, to draw a current of air through it. It 
is a simple and excellent device. 

In my own house I use the high " pantry-sink " cock 
for the supply of the wash-bowl, which favors the cleanly 
Mohammedan practice of v/ashing in running water. 



CHAPTER XX. 



WATER-CLOSETS. 



WATER-CLOSETS have, naturally, 
been the subject of more ingenuity, 
and of more argument, than any thing 
else connected with the subject of house- 
drainage. 

It is hardly necessary at this late date 
to say any thing to the limited public 
which reads on such subjects about the 
absolute inadmissibility of the almost 
universal pan-closet, which was so lately 
the great favorite of landlords and of 
builders, and which, in spite of its compli- 
cation and intricacy, was, owing to the 
great demand for it, sold more cheaply, 
and therefore more widely, than any other. 



WA TER- CLOSE TS. 1 3 1 

It is enough to say that those who care 
for safety in drainage works should neither 
adopt it in new construction nor retain it 
where it already exists. It is not, and it 
can not be made, a safe water-closet. To 
a greater or less degree, the objections to 
it hold in the case of every other closet 
in the market which has, anywhere in the 
course of its outlet, any thing of the nature 
of a valve or moving part. 

It is not an overstatement of the uni- 
versal conviction of skillful sanitarians to 
say that the range of unexceptionable 
water-closets is limited to such as have a 
free water-way from the bowl to the soil- 
pipe, depending for their trapping, and 
in some cases for their holding of a bowl- 
ful of water, on an elevation of the over- 
flow point. These may be classed in a 
general way as ''hopper " closets. The 
simplest form of this closet is a funnel- 
shaped vase reaching from the floor to 



132 



WA TER-CLOSE TS. 



the seat. At the bottom it is connected 
with an S trap, having a depth of seal 
generally of from three-fourths of an inch 
to an inch and a half. This is a cheap 
and good utensil for the commoner uses. 
It is made of earthenware or of enameled 
iron, and in its best form its rear portion 
is nearly or quite vertical. What is 
known as the '' short hopper," made of 
iron or of earthenware, has a shallow 
bowl, with a trap rising at its side and 
entirely above the floor. These are the 
best of the cheap closets. 

Pursuing the intention already an- 
nounced, to avoid any thing like a cata- 
loguing of plumbers' supplies, and 
referring to what has already been said 
about my own inventions, I give here- 
with, as an illustration of the better class 
of closets, a vertical cross-section of the 
Dececo closet with its trap and discharg- 
ing siphon. In this closet I have tried 



WA TER-CLOSE TS. 133 

to overcome the objections to the 
mechanical or valve closets, while retain- 
ing the very great advantages of a deep 
bowlful of water for the reception of 
deposits and for the suppression of odor. 

The closet has a seal about four inches 
deep, a depth of water of nearly seven 
inches, disposed in the most useful way, 
and a sufficient submersion of the front 
part of the bowl. While it is possible 
under strong siphonage to reduce the 
depth of its water considerably, it is not 
possible, under any conditions that can 
occur in practice, to break its seal, the 
rising limb being sufficiently large to give 
an adequate passage to a continuous 
stream of air without removing the water 
to such a point as to unseal the trap. It 
has the further advantage that its seal is 
in full view and is always under control. 
When it seems to be right it is right. 

The peculiar operation on which it 



134 



WATER-CLOSETS. 



depends for its discharge is due to the 
use of an outlet weir below the floor, 
which is the invention of Mr. Rogers 




FIG. 7.— THE DECECO WATER-CLOSET. 



Field, an English engineer. It is, in fact, 
a modified Field's flush tank. 

The outer or discharging limb of the 
syphon reaches down into the weir- 



WA TER- CLOSE TS. 135 

chamber. The depth of seal Is the dis- 
tance from the surface of the water in the 
bowl to the top of the intake X, and this 
is regulated by the height of the overflow 
point O. The closet is supplied with 
water through an ordinary flushing-rim, 
connected with a service-box or cistern 
overhead. The cistern is operated by a 
pendent pull. When the pull is drawn 
down, a copious supply of water flows 
Into all parts of the bowl through the 
flushing-rim, washing it completely and 
raising the level of its water rapidly. 
The surplus overflows at O faster than it 
can be discharged over the weir-top T, 
without rising so high as to close the 
opening at V. This closure shuts off the 
air In the siphon from the air In the soil- 
pipe, with which it Is ordinarily in com- 
munication. The water flowlnof throuorh 
the long limb of the siphon, In an Irregu- 
lar stream, carries the air with It, and 



1 36 WA TER-CL OSE TS. 

there Is soon established a strong siphon 
action, which continues until the water in 
the bowl, Into which a strong stream con- 
tinues to flow, descends below the top of 
the Intake X. Then air Is admitted at 
this point, and the flow through the 
siphon is checked. The discharge at T 
continuing, the water in the weir-chamber 
soon falls sufficiently to allow air to enter 
at Y and empty the siphon. The water 
in that part of the siphon between X 
and O falls back and establishes an Im- 
mediate hydraulic seal at the intake. 
The service-box Is so arranged that after 
the main supply is stopped a small stream 
continues to be discharged Into the bowl 
until it Is filled to the height of the over- 
flow point. 

It was evident from long and success- 
ful experience with Field's flush-tank, 
that the principle on which this closet Is 
constructed is a perfectly correct one. 



WA TER- CLOSE TS. 1 3 7 

It has underorone few chancres since its 
original construction three years ago, 
and the several hundred closets now in 
use are invariably satisfactory, so far as 
reported. 

The first ones made, five in number, 
were set up in the White House after the 
removal of the President in t88i. They 
are still perfectly successful in their work- 
ing. After ample trial for servants' use, 
and for more than a year in a girls' board- 
ing-school, an experimental one is now 
beine tested with the rougrh use and rouorh 
handling of the operatives of a spinning- 
mill. It has, during the seven weeks since 
it was put in, given complete satisfaction. 
So far as I can see, this closet accom- 
plishes perfectly every purpose for which 
a water-closet, slop-hopper, or urinal is 
required. 

In practice, It uses at each opera- 
tion over two and a half gallons of 



138 WA TER- CLOSE TS. 

water, which gives a thorough flushing to 
the soil-pipe and drain, while it has the 
great advantage of sending a good part 
of its water into the soil-pipe in ad- 
vance of the foul matters, lubricaing their 
passage through the whole drainage sys- 
tem. Although this considerable volume 
of water is essential to Its complete 
efficiency, the closet may be emptied by 
pouring Into It suddenly less than two 
quarts of water. A large pail of slops 
thrown In as rapidly as possible fails to 
overflow It, and barrels of water might be 
poured through It In succession as fast as 
the three-Inch outlet can discharge it. 

The setting of water-closets In the best 
manner Is most easily secured when hop- 
per or other plain closets are used ; that 
is, closets with no machinery under the 
seat. By the best manner, I mean such 
setting as requires the minimum of car- 
pentry, preferably nothing whatever but 



WA TER-CLOSE TS. 139 

a single well-finished hard-wood plank 
with a hole through it, resting on cleats 
at the sides and hinged to be turned back 
out of the way. It is better that there 
should not even be a cover to the hole. 
The entire closet, inside and out, should 
be as thoroughly exposed to view, to 
ventilation, and to perfect cleansing as 
possible. 

If the floor and back and side walls be 
covered with glazed tiles — preferably 
white — so much the better ; but a cheap 
and satisfactory setting is secured by a 
slate floorine with hard-wood finish 
around the sides. Even oil-cloth on the 
floor, and the ordinary base-board and 
plaster at the sides and back, answer a 
very good purpose ; the great thing is to 
have a perfect exposure to sight and to 
air. 

The costly housing-in of the closet by 
a close seat and cover and a close riser in 



1 40 WA TER. CLOSE TS. 

front may serve a very good purpose as 
an ornamental piece of cabinet-work, but 
it too often covers a condition of 
things that no fastidious housekeeper 
would knowingly tolerate. Sloppage, 
leakage, and the tainted air rising through 
the irregular holes left for the soil-pipe, 
unite to make this space untidy and in 
every way objectionable. Some sort of 
housing-in is necessary with closets which 
have machinery about them, but the 
whole class of hopper closets may be 
entirely free from any thing or any con- 
dition to make such concealment desir- 
able. 

It is possible that my decided prefer- 
ence for the Dececo is only an Incident 
of paternity — but It Is a decided prefer- 
ence nevertheless. 

Note. — The foregoing- remarks on water-closets are 
left as they were written in 1885. So far as general 
principles are concerned, they are as true now as they 



WA TER- CLOSE TS. 1 4 1 

were believed to be then, but the general practice has 
changed greatly. 

I am disposed to take to myself some measure of 
credit for this change. It has been largely due to the 
modern method of setting the closet, which was first ap- 
plied in work that I arranged for the late E. F. Bowditch 
of P^ramingham, Mass., early in 1879. Before that time, 
the water-closet was concealed by carpentry, in the sup- 
posed interests of decency, and for the protection of the 
mechanism by which the water-supply was furnished. 

The closet at Mr. Bowditch's was a simple " long hop- 
per," standing like a white vase on a flooring of white 
tiles. The walls were tiled to the height of the seat, 
which was a single ash board, twenty inches wide, rest- 
ing on cleats at its ends, standing free of the tiling at the 
back by some inches, hinged to turn up against the back 
wall, and having a hole without a cover. The previous 
practice having been to conceal, in the most shame-faced 
manner, everything connected with a water-closet, the 
practice was here inaugurated of exposing everything in 
the frankest way — exposing it to perfect ventilation and 
inspection, and incidentally shutting off the foul-air way, 
by which cellar air and the exhalations of foul sloppage 
a1)out enclosed closets, sinks, basins and baths, had been 
freely distributed throughout the house. 

This arrangement necessitated the use of a pendent- 
chain pull to discharge the supply-tank above, and for- 
tunately it made the old system of valve supply impossible. 



142 WA TER-CLOSE TS. 

In fact, it inaugurated the practice, now almost universal, 
of exposing all fixtures as freely as possible — even bath- 
tubs now standing on their own feet, with a full sweep of 
air about them. 

An absurd tendency is still retained, in a certain class 
of minds, to use a fiap cover over the seat of the closet ; 
but this relic of immodesty will pass in time, and the 
bowl will then in all houses, as now in the best, have the 
benefit of inspection and freer ventilation. 

The " pan " closet has given place to the " washout " 
for cheaper work, and this is a vast improvement. The 
Dececo has many imitators, and it may fairly be said 
that house-drainage has undergone a complete and most 
beneficent revolution within the past fifteen years. 



CHAPTER XXI. 

SINKS. 

KITCHEN and pantry sinks are used 
for the discharge of matters which 
in their original condition are not offen- 
sive. They are, therefore, in the popular 
estimation, of much less serious conse- 
quence to the sanitary condition of the 
house than are water-closets. This tem- 
porarily different condition, however, of 
the matters which they receive, very soon 
gives place to a similar condition of the 
matters which they have discharged. 

After a little retention, putrefaction 
sets in, and the refuse food of the sink 
becomes as offensive and objectionable as 
does the digested food of the water-closet. 



144 SINKS. 

In the one case as In the other, It Is very 
Important to secure a complete removal 
of all foul matters well beyond the house 
before putrefaction. The liability to de- 
tention and deposit Is much greater In 
case of the sink than in the case of the 
closet, for the reason that, with much less 
flushing, there is discharged through its 
waste-pipe a considerable amount of 
heated and temporarily liquefied grease. 

This grease passes the strainer of the 
sink and Is unnoticed, but, as it cools 
along Its course. It attaches Itself to the 
sides of the pipe in constantly increasing 
accumulations, until the channel Is often 
nearly or quite obstructed. It Is by no 
means pure grease that Is thus attached. 
In Its congelation there are Involved par- 
ticles of highly putrescible matters, and 
the ordinary kitchen-sink waste-pipe Is the 
seat of a constant decomposition — mostly 
beyond the trap, and for this reason not 



SINKS. 145 

especially noticeable — but especially foul 
nevertheless. 

Not to get rid of the putrefaction, but 
to prevent the obstruction of the pipe, 
there have been invented various forms 
of grease-trap, having for their purpose 
the hardening of the grease under condi- 
tions which will allow it to be removed. 
These grease-traps would answer a better 
purpose than they do if we could depend 
on their being regularly attended to; but 
so long as water will flow from the sink, 
servants will give themselves but little 
trouble about such accumulations. No 
accumulation for longer than a single day 
should be tolerated. 

I have employed a device that has now 
been in considerable use for several years, 
which seems to meet the requirements of 
the case quite completely. There is built 
beneath the sink, and in connection with 
it, a '' flush-pot " large enough to hold 



146 SINKS. 

several gallons of water. Its top is cov- 



FIG. 8 THE DECECO FLUSH-POT FOR SINKS. 

ered by a strainer, about eight inches in 



SINKS. 147 

diameter, and pierced with large holes. 
This constitutes a portion of the floor of 
the sink. The outlet of the flush-pot is 
closed with a plug, like a wash-basin plug, 
which is attached to a spindle rising 
through the strainer. The outlet is con- 
nected with the drain by a small pipe, 
having a common trap, which is useful 
only during the short periods when the 
plug is withdrawn. 

Ordinarily, the outlet stands closed. 
Water thrown into the sink flows through 
the strainer, leaving all coarser substances 
to be brushed up and bitmiedin the range.'^ 
Little by little, the flush-pot becomes 
filled, and during this slow process most 
of the grease becomes congealed. When 
it is nearly full, the water can be seen, 
even before it reaches the strainer. Then 

*This simple cremation of the worst elements of house-garb- 
age costs no money and little trouble. It solves one of the 
difficult domestic problems. 



148 SINKS. 

the spindle and plug are raised and held 
up until the gurgling of air through the 
trap indicates that the pot is empty. Then 
the outlet is closed and the fillina- begins 
again. The strainer and spindle may be 
lifted out together, exposing the whole 
interior of the flush-pot, which may thus 
be given a daily cleansing and kept in as 
good order as any other iron vessel in the 
kitchen. 

The theory of the success of this ap- 
paratus is very simple. There is abso- 
lutely nothing running through the waste- 
pipe except during the moment when the 
flush-pot is being discharged, and then 
the whole mass flows with such force as 
to carry every thing with it. 

At my own house, having occasion to 
inspect the main drain (diameter three 
inches), I found that neither a copiously 
supplied water-closet nor a bath-tub had 
such flushing effect as had the discharge 



SINKS, 149 

of the flush-pot in the kitchen. Its flow 
filled the drain more than half full with a 
stream of good velocity. 

In the first application of the flush-pot 
to pantry sinks, it was given about the 
same capacity with that of the kitchen 
sink. As, however, it is desirable to fill 
the pantry sink for washing dishes, it be- 
came necessary to waste the large volume 
needed to fill the flush-pot. To avoid 
this Its capacity has now been reduced to 
about one gallon, which is enough to in- 
sure a good flow from the ordinary accu- 
mulated drippings of the sink. When 
the sink Itself is filled, its contents as well 
as those of the flush-pot constitute an 
abundant flushing volume, the strainer 
being sufliclently open to allow a rapid 
flow. 

Note. — This device has not come into general use. 
It requires some personal attention, and this cannot be 
depended upon with changing cooks. I find it most 



150 SINKS. 

satisfactory in my own house for both kitchen and 
pantry. 

Experience has shown, however, that the frequent 
stoppage of sink-traps and waste-pipes of large size is 
chiefly due to the fact that the small stream flowing 
through them has not suf^ficient force to keep them clean. 

After use for a certain time, the gradual accumulation 
of congealed grease on the walls of the pipe closes the 
passage almost entirely. We have, then, not a direct 
channel with smooth metallic walls, but a tortuous and 
h-regular one, winding through a mass of deposit. The 
detachment of parts of the decomposing mass may at 
any time cause complete obstruction. Then follows the 
use of potash to " cut " a passage through it, or of hot 
water to melt the grease. This being troublesome, a 
costly and elaborate " grease-trap " is sometimes used to 
hold back the offending material. All goes well for a 
time, until the trap itself becomes filled, save for the tor- 
tuous waterway above described. In time the grease- 
trap, which servants are sure to neglect, as well as the 
pipe it was intended to protect, is cleaned out by the 
plumber, and a fresh start is taken. 

The real remedy is to make the trap and pipe so small 
that the natural flow from the sink will keep it always 
clean. I have not dared, in the face of the universal 
belief that a pipe that is liable to become obstructed 
should therefore be made large, to advise the use of 
kitchen wastes less than one and a quarter inches in 



SINKS. 151 

diameter. Two inches is generally thought to be as 
small as is safe. It is my own conviction, however, that 
it would be safer to make the diameter less thaJi one 
inch. 

This idea has had curious confirmation in a case that 
has just come to my notice. In 1885 I put in a kitchen 
waste-pipe, of lead, at Princeton, N. J., which was one 
and a half inches in diameter. It ran directly down 
through the floor and then continued horizontally (ap- 
proximately) across the kitchen about twenty feet. In 




Fig. 9. 

time the floor timbers rotted and the springing of the 
floor flattened the pipe. After eight or nine years the 
house was converted into " Evelyn College," with some 
thirty students, the family, and servants— all living in the 
building, and all served from this single kitchen. In 
1894 an inspection of tbe plumbing was called for. 

It was found that this waste-pipe had — surely some 
years before — been jammed almost flat. A section of it 
was cut out, and its end was smoothed to make a type 
from which Figure 9 was printed. It seems incredible, 
but through this small slit the kitchen-sink wastes of a 
household of about forty persons flowed for some years 
without anyone knowing that iis original water-way had 



152 SINKS. 

been contracted. The area of the cross-section of this 
flattened pipe was not more than three-tenths of an 
inch. The chances for good service would have been 
much better with a circular section half an inch in diam- 
eter, and I verily believe that a waste-pipe of this size, 
protected by a strainer with quarter-inch holes, would be 
safer than a larger one. We often find the winding chan- 
nel through the greasy deposits of a 2-inch pipe to be less 
than this. 

The world seems to have a curious infatuation in favor 
of some sort of " grease-trap." In Chicago its use is 
compulsory. As generally constructed, it is a sanitary 
nuisance, and I know of only one device of the sort that 
I would use. This is the " Eduction " grease-trap, made 
by Flushtank Company, of Richmond, Ind. Its deposits 
are torn out and washed away by a frequent strong 
flush. For my own use, I should prefer a very small 
waste-pipe, protected by a good strainer and a Pure 
trap. 



CHAPTER XXII. 

OVERFLOWS AND STOP-COCKS. 

OVERFLOWS, Intended for the safe 
removal of surplus water from bath- 
tubs, wash-bowls, etc., are necessarily on 
the house side of the trap. They are 
practically never reached by a strong 
flushing stream, and their walls accumu- 
late filth and slime to a deeree that would 
hardly be believed. They constitute the 
nastiest element of modern house-drain- 
age of the better order. Perhaps they 
are not a serious source of danger, but 
they are, more often than any other part 
of the plumbing work, except the urinal, 
the source of the offensive drain-smell so 



154 



O VERFL WS A ND S TOP- CO CKS. 



often observed on first coming into a 
house from the fresh air. 

In the stationary wash-basin as at pres- 
ent arranged, there seems to be no easy 
way to get over the difficulty, a difficulty 
which of Itself should be a sufficient rea- 
son for excluding these fixtures from 
sleeping-rooms. The basin overflow is 
objectionable for substantially the same 
reason that the bath-tub overflow is ob- 
jectionable, though perhaps to a slighter 
degree owing to the smaller surface 
exposed to the accumulation of deposits.* 

The concealed overflow of the bath-tub 
may, fortunately, be dispensed with, and 
In this case the difficulty inseparable from 
the arrangement may be obviated. It 
will, perhaps, be instructive to illustrate 
by a diagram the reason why the usual 
hidden overflow is so objectionable. 

In this cut, A Is the waste-pipe at the 
bottom of the tub, by which Its contents 

*See the " Note " at the end of Chapter XIX. 



O VERFL O WS A ND S TOP- CO CKS. 



155 



are discharged on the withdrawal of the 
plug. B is the overflow pipe, its connec- 
tion with the tub being through a per- 
forated screen. C is the trap by which 




FIG. 10. — HIDDEN OVERFLOW OF BATH. 



the waste-pipe is shut off from the drain- 
age system, and which has incidentally 
the effect of retardinof the flow of water 
through the waste-pipe. If we suppose 



156 O VERFL OWS AND S TOP- CO CKS. 

the tub to be filled to the level of the 
overflow and its waste-plug to be removed, 
the water will immediately rise in the 
overflow pipe to very nearly its height in 
the tub. It is of course impregnated with 
the impurities of the water in the bath. 
Furthermore, the lighter particles of 
organic matter flowing through the waste 
will, some of them, rise by their levity 
into the overflow pipe. The water rushes 
up into this pipe with much force, but it 
descends only very slovv^ly as the level in 
the bath descends, so that at each opera- 
tion there is a tendency to deposit adhe- 
sive matters to its walls. What is so de- 
posited decomposes and escapes little by 
little in a gaseous form through the per- 
forated screen into the air of the room. 
There is a free circulation of air through 
the pipe when the plug is out. The 
amount of these decomposing mat- 
ters is somewhat increased, though prob- 



O VERFL OWS AND S TOP- CO CKS. 1 5 7 

ably not very much, by floating particles 
passing through the screen when the 
overflow Is performing Its legitimate func- 
tion. 

This Is the simplest statement of the 
proposition, and this Is perhaps the least 
objectionable form of hidden overflow. 
Where the waste-pipe Is closed at the 
bottom of the overflow by a plug or valve 
attached to a spindle rising through the 
overflow-pipe — a very favorite device 
with some plumbers, and already described 
In connection with wash-bowls — the diffi- 
culty Is In every way aggravated and the 
amount of fouled surface Is much In- 
creased. The Inherent defect here Illus- 
trated attaches to every overflow of this 
general character connected with any part 
of the plumbing work. 

In the case of a bath-tub it may very 
easily be avoided, as shown In the next 
diagram, by doing away entirely with the 



158 



OVERFLOWS AND STOP-COCKS. 



overflow-pipe B and its perforated screen, 
and using for the closure of the waste- 
outlet Ay as a substitute for the ordinary 
plug, a pipe fitting into the outlet and 




FIG. II.— STANDING OVERFLOW AND PLUG FOR BATH. 

rising to the height desired for the water 
in the bath. If the upper end of this 
pipe be given a trumpet-shaped opening, 
its capacity will be increased. 



OVERFLOWS AND STOP-COCKS. I59 

Stop cocks need no special notice In 
this book, except In connection with 
bath-tubs. Most, If not all, of the Eng- 
lish earthenware bath-tubs Imported Into 
this country, and many even of the plan- 
ished copper, and enameled iron tubs 
made here, are furnished with an Ingeni- 
ous device for delivering the supply near 
the bottom of the tub In such a manner 
as to mix the hot and cold water at the 
delivery and to admit the supply with 
little noise. The last may be an advan- 
tage. The first may be perfectly accom- 
plished by delivering the hot and cold 
water through a single nozzle at the top 
of the tub In a convenient position for 
drawlnor water for other uses. 

There are doubtless many cases where 
the bottom delivery of the supply may be 
free from sanitary objections, but they 
are fewer than would be supposed, and It 
seems strange that the frequent serious 



l6o OVERFLOWS AND STOP-COCKS. 

objection to the arrangement should have 
been so generally overlooked. This bot- 
tom delivery is substantially a cock for 
drawing water, and all who use such 
cocks for filling wash-bowls must have 
noticed a frequent indraft of air when the 
cock is open. Sometimes when water is 
being drawn from the lower part of the 
supply-pipe, the head in the upper part 
is annihilated, and if a cock is opened the 
water falls in the supply-pipe, air rushing 
in to take its place. 

The indraft of air is not of much con- 
sequence, but the indraft of a pipeful of 
dirty water from a bath-tub does not sug- 
gest a pleasant modification of the quality 
of the water supply of the house. In 
this case, as in many others, an apparent 
mechanical improvement, securing only 
incidental benefits, should be discouraged. 
In my judgment the only perfectly safe 
and satisfactory arrangement for baths 



OVERFLOWS AND STOP-COCKS. l6l 

thus far devised is one by which the 
water is drawn through a faucet above 
the water-hne, and by which the outlet Is 
closed by a stand-pipe serving as the only 
overflow of the tub. 

Laundry trays, as they are now ahiiost 
universally arranged, are hardly to be 
regarded as a conspicuous element of the 
sanitary works of a house. There are 
few cases in which we find anything about 
them that is seriously objectionable. 
With them, as with sinks, water-closets, 
and wash-basins, it is best to avoid 
all unnecessary carpentry. It is, of 
course, best that they should be made of 
some other material than wood — either 
slate, soapstone, cement, or earthenware. 
Earthenware tubs, supported on galvan- 
ized iron legs and surrounded by a sim- 
ple border of hard w^ood, seem to ask 
for no Improvement. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

AN EXAMPLE OF SIMPLE AND GOOD WORK. 

SIMPLICITY in house-drainage, and 
a marked contrast to the multipH- 
cation and compHcation so often found 
in the better class of buildings, are illus- 
trated in the case of a very fine and 
costly house, the plumbing of which I 
am now superintending. 

It has in the basement one kitchen- 
sink with the flush-pot, one servants' 
water-closet, and four laundry-tubs. The 
main soil-pipe runs under the base- 
ment floor near both of these ; it is 
of extra-heavy iron, with the joints 
leaded, and tested, under water pressure, 
to absolute tightness. It is then, so far 
as it lies below the floor, completely 



AN EXAMPLE OF GOOD WORK. 163 

encased in Portland cement mortar, and 
this, again, in well made concrete ; it 
turns up near the laundry-tubs, and near 
the ceiling it receives a branch pipe com- 
ing from a lavatory on the floor, twenty- 
five feet away ; it then passes through 
the floor and receives the waste of the 
flush-pot of the pantry-sink ; rising to the 
ceiling, it receives the waste of a bath- 
tub and wash-stand on one side, and on 
the other the waste of a Dececo water- 
closet and wash-stand ; passing through 
the next floor, it receives the wastes of 
the fixtures in the servants' bath-room — 
a straight hopper closet, a bath-tub, and a 
wash-stand ; above the ceiling of that 
room, its four inches size is increased to 
six inches, and it passes with this larger 
diameter a short distance through the 
roof, its top being closed by a large wire 
basket inserted in the hub of the six-inch 
pipe ; the branch pipe under the ceiling 



164 AN EXAMPLE OF GOOD WORK. 

of the cellar is connected with a Dececo 
closet and a wash-stand in the lavatory, 
and is continued up, without other con- 
nections, to its increaser and a six-inch 
top joint through the roof. 

This is the full complement of the 
drainage appliances which, in accordance 
with modern ideas, it was thought neces- 
sary and wise to introduce into a house 
which, even five years ago ^^ would have 
had twice as many closets and baths, and 
at least four times as many wash-basins, 
to say nothing of two or three urinals 
and one or two house-maid's sinks. The 
whole cost of the work to be done, 
including all hot and cold water-supply, 
and the outside connection with the 
sewer of six roof-water conductors, is 
just about one thousand dollars. Under 
the old method, supposing the same 
material and workmanship to be used, 
* 1880. 



AN EXAMPLE OE GOOD WORK. 165 

and considering the long lateral waste- 
pipes and hot and cold water and cir- 
culation pipes of the different baths and 
basins, the cost would hardly have been 
less than twenty-five hundred dollars. 
The saving of cost effected is, in my 
judgment, of much less consequence than 
the simplicity secured. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

OWNERS, ARCHITECTS AND PLUMBERS. 

IT has already been said that the 
character and arrangement of the 
plumbing work of modern houses are 
much more controlled by plumbers than 
by any body else. This is generally quite 
as true with reference to houses built 
under the advice and direction of archi- 
tects as in other cases. 

There are a few architects who take a 
lively interest in sanitary works, but they 
are very few. The fact is, that an archi- 
tect is, generally, either disqualified or 
disinclined, by nature or by training, 
for the minute attention to hidden details 
which the proper control of house drain- 



OWNERS, ARCHITECTS, PLUMBERS 167 

age would require of him. It is not to 
be expected that a man who has made 
himself a safe guide and leader of public 
taste, who has acquired a mastery of the 
engineering problems involved in safe 
and economical construction, and who has 
learned how to contract a client's desires 
to the requirements of space and of price, 
should have been able to keep himself 
au courant with the rapidly growing 
improvements of an art, which, twenty 
years ago, was only a trade. 

As a matter of fact, the architect rarely 
knows or cares any thing about the 
plumbing of a house beyond the selection 
of the spaces to be given to its fixtures. 
He gives the plumber a rough idea as to 
where certain fixtures are to be placed, 
and as to their general style. Beyond 
that — I am not speaking of all architects, 
but of architects as a class — he is gener- 
ally indifferent to the whole business. 



i68 IVNERS, ARCHITECTS, PL UMBERS. 

The result is — as it may be. Some 
plumbers are capable of writing good 
specifications and some are not. It by 
no means always happens that the best 
plumbers and the best architects work 
in conjunction. 

I write more feelingly on this subject, 
because I have recently, in more than one 
instance, on being called to take charge 
of the drainage of very fine houses already 
in course of construction, had the plumb- 
ing specifications submitted to me. They 
happen in all cases to have been written 
for places where the Board of Health has 
established no formula for the work and 
has furnished no printed blanks. Not 
one of them would have done fair credit 
to an intelligent plumber of the year of 
our Lord, 1870. In every case an 
unnecessary amount of work would have 
been done and much of it would have 
been unsafe when it was done. The 



O WNERS, ARCHITECTS, PL UMBERS. 1 69 

question often comes up, in the practice 
of an engineer of sanitary drainage, as to 
whether or not to change such work as 
these specifications provided for, it being 
already constructed and in operation. 
No one who knew the first rudiments of 
the business, would think of introducing 
it into a new building. 

In one case, I was called to a house so 
near completion that all of its main pipes 
had been put in place, and a wilderness 
of pipes they were. I recommended that 
they be removed, all but one of them, 
and that a fresh start be taken. The 
owner referred the question, as owners so 
often will, to the arbitration of dollars 
and cents. An estimate, made by the 
plumber who had done the work, showed 
that it would be somewhat cheaper to 
wipe it all out, begin again, and follow 
my plans, than to finish what he had 
begun, according to his own. 



1 70 WNERS, ARCHITECTS, PL UMBERS. 

The criticism here Is In no sense 
against the plumber nor against the 
architect, but against the system. If an 
architect tells his client that he prefers to 
have an expert to take charge of the 
plumbing, the client may object to pay- 
ing an extra fee or, as it seems to him, 
two fees for the same work. The archi- 
tect, of course, can not be expected to pay 
for the extra services, so he follows the 
old course of turning the matter over to 
his plumber, and, very properly, justifies 
himself with the sufficient plea of Usage. 
As an incidental result, the owner gener- 
ally pays considerably more for the toler- 
able work that he gets than he would pay, 
fees included, for the more perfect work 
that he mJght get. 

Another point in this connection is of 
great Interest. It is being actively dis- 
cussed by the better plumbers and by the 
sanitary journals. It is that plumbing 



O WNERS, ARCHITECTS, PL UMBERS. 1 7 1 

work should, at least, never be done at 
second hand. That is, that the whole 
job should not be given to a contractor, 
allowing him, in his turn, to contract out 
the plumbing work. Indeed, this results 
so generally in positive injury to the 
health of the people that it would seem a 
proper subject for legislative prohibition. 
Naturally, all that the building con- 
tractor is responsible for is, that water 
shall flow and waste shall run, without 
bursting the pipes or destroying the ceil- 
ings, until after the house has been 
accepted and taken off his hands. His 
only connection with the enterprise is a 
business connection and his only motive 
is his business interest. He builds the 
house to make money on it, and the more 
cheaply he can get the architect's require- 
ments for water-closets, baths, tubs, sinks, 
etc., complied with, the more money he 
will make. 



172 WNERS, ARCHITECTS, PL UMBERS, 

While this course of sub-letting is bad 
enough In the case of houses built for 
immediate sale, or In the case of tenement 
houses, It Is in a certain way explicable ; 
but that any man who Is building a house 
for his own occupation, should permit 
this vital element of Its safety as a habita- 
tion, to become the object of dicker and 
flint-skinning between two men who care 
only to make what money they can out 
of it, is most incomprehensible. 

If it is suspected that what Is here 
written is written with a view to the pecu- 
niary interest of my own profession, with 
its rapidly growing membership, I confess 
at once and most frankly that the suspi- 
cion is well founded. I should not have 
taken the trouble to write this book for 
the questionable compensation It offers in 
the way of copyright. I have written it 
because I think it may advance the inter- 
ests of engineers. If that should be 



. WNERS, ARCHITECTS, PL UMBERS. 173 

thought an improper or a selfish motive, 
let me say that I trust it will also, and in 
much greater degree, advance the inter- 
ests of all who live in houses which have 
or which need drainage works of any 
kind. That it will also benefit the better 
class of plumbers, ought not to be 
doubtful. 



CHAPTER XXV. 

SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

THOSE who live In isolated houses, in 
the country and In the smaller 
towns, generally solve the whole prob- 
lem of sewage disposal by the simple 
formula, '' Out of sight, out of mind." 
The universal remedy Is a hole In the 
ground Into which every thing in the 
shape of liquid wastes is delivered. The 
only criticism that most people apply to 
the apparatus relates to the frequency 
with which it requires to be emptied 
and to the cost of the operation. 

What goes on In the cesspool, and In 
the ground about it, is entirely unheeded. 
So long as the overflow is disposed of, 



SE WA GE DISPOSAL. 1 7 5 

the devil may care what the hidden pro- 
cesses of disposal are. Unfortunately, 
the devil does care, and much of the 
worst work that he effects, in his assault 
on the health of his unwitting subjects, 
has its starting point in the common 
cesspool. The worst sewer in the world 
is rarely so bad as the usual cesspool. 
In comparison with it, a sewer that would 
be regarded as very foul is purity itself. 

The cesspool works its injury chiefly 
in three directions : 

A. It holds an accumulation of filth 
of the worst character, in a state of 
active putrefaction, giving off gases pro- 
duced by a decomposition that takes 
place under conditions of the worst sort. 
These gases can not be entirely sup- 
pressed while a channel remains open 
for the admission of liquid to the cavern. 
Unless delivered into the atmosphere, 
which they inevitably taint, they find 



176 SEWAGE DISPOSAL, 

their way back more or less directly into 
the drainage system of the house. 

B. In so far as the walls of the cess- 
pools and the surrounding earth are per- 
meable to their passage these gases pol- 
lute and poison the ground air, and if 
near the house, this may find its way 
from the earth into the cellar. 

C. Its liquid leachings and ooze, en- 
riched with the soluble productions of 
a fatal putrefaction, travel through porous 
soils, through gravel or sand streaks in 
heavy ground, and through fissures in 
rocks to pollute the water of wells and 
springs even at a considerable distance. 

If the fraternity of sanitarians through- 
out the world are in accord on any one 
point, it is that the common cesspool, 
even under the best conditions, is abso- 
lutely inadmissible. Surely no house- 
holder having the least regard for the 
health of his own family, or for that of 



SE WA GE DISPOSA L. 177 

his neighbors, once realizing the inevitable 
condition, will tolerate its perpetuation. 
Fortunately it is no longer necessary 
that, even In connection with the simplest 
and poorest house, this dangerous nuisance 
should exist. The sanitary fraternity 
are also in full accord as to the general 
principles of an improved mode of 
disposal. 

What concerns us, in this connection, 
is a proper means for getting rid of the 
organic refuse and filth contained in the 
liquid wastes — including those of the 
water-closet and kitchen sink — of isolated 
houses which have at least a small area of 
land connected with them. 

The principle on which the best dis- 
posal thus far devised is based is this : 

The aerated upper layers of the soil are 
a universal destroyer of whatever organic 
impurities may be deposited on the sur- 
face or Intermixed with the earth. Dead 



178 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

organic matter Is completely destroyed 
by natural processes of oxidation and 
nitrification, wherever, under natural con- 
ditions, it is exposed directly or indirectly 
to the action of the atmosphere in the 
soil. The agents of destruction in this 
case are the bacteria of decomposition, 
those all-pervading micro-organisms, 
whose increase, growth, and life involve 
the combination of atmospheric oxygen 
with the elements of organized matter, 
a combination always set up under con- 
ditions favorable to the growth of these 
bacteria. Aeration is a necessary condi- 
tion of the process. 

When urine or other foul liquid is 
thrown on to the surface of the ground, it 
sinks into it and deposits on the surfaces 
of Its particles the organic Impurities 
which it contains. Its water, descending 
still further, has become essentially puri- 
fied. As the water sinks away, air enters 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 179 

to take Its place, and every particle of 
soil that Is coated with the waste matters 
is surrounded with air rich In oxygen. 
The bacteria, present In all fertile soils, 
combine the two — much as the respira- 
tory process of higher organisms com- 
bines the oxygen Inhaled by the lungs 
with effete matters of venous blood. 

This Is a slight and popular statement 
of the results of recent scientific Investi- 
gation. The process Is a continuous one. 
The destruction of one dose of wastes 
being accomplished the destroyers are 
ever eager for more. For their success- 
ful and continued operation It Is only 
necessary that the w^aste matters should 
be supplied and that air should be fur- 
nished alternately. This is the principle 
on which Is based the success of the sys- 
tem of sewage purification by broad 
irrigation and by intermittent downward 
filtration. It is as effective in taking care 



1 80 SB WA GE DISPOSAL. 

of the waste of a city as of that of a 
single house, the difference being only a 
difference of degree. 

In the case under consideration, the 
disposal of the wastes of a single dwell- 
ing, generally on land very near the 
house, may be accomplished in a hidden 
and inodorous manner. The sanitary 
result would be complete If they were 
delivered Intermittently over the sur- 
face of a lawn. Other considerations 
sometimes make it important that 
sewage be kept out of sight and that 
the distribution of the wastes be beneath 
the surface. 

The Rev. Henry Moule, the Inventor 
of the Earth-Closet, seeking means for 
disposing of liquid wastes of the house- 
hold, for which his closet Is not suited, 
laid agricultural drain tiles along the foot 
of a grape-vine trellis, leaving their 
joints open, so that the slops reaching the 



SE WA GE DISPOSAL. 1 8 1 

drain could escape freely Into the ground. 
The Influence of this subsoil irrigation 
on the growth of the vines and of grass 
was very marked and the disposal was 
complete and continuous. Later (1868) 
Mr. Rogers Field adopted a modifi- 
cation of the same device in disposing 
of the liquid wastes of cottaores at Shen- 
field, Essex, England. He added the 
Important improvement of a flush-tank 
In which the liquids were retained 
until it became full, the whole volume 
being then rapidly discharged into the 
tiles. 

This was a great advance. It secured 
the uniform distribution of the liquid 
throughout the whole length of the 
drains and gave ample time, while 
the tank was refilling, for the water to 
settle completely away, allowing air to 
enter and complete the destruction of the 
impurities before the next discharge. 



1 82 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

The writer, In connection with his resi- 
dence at Newport, adopted Mr. Moule's 
device In 1869, as soon as It was made 
known, and added Mr. Field's improve- 
ment soon after the publication of his 
process. At first, a little difficulty resulted 
from the delivery of grease and flocculent 
matter into the tiles, leading to the ob- 
struction of their joints. Early in the 
experiment, It usually became necessary 
as often as once a year to lift the tiles and 
wash out their accumulations. This led 
to the Interposition of a settling basin to 
retain all of these coarser matters. Later 
the settling basin was placed on the house 
side of the flush-tank to prevent the dis- 
turbance of the deposits in the former 
by the vigorous discharge of the latter. 

The house was provided with earth 
closets, but everything not deposited in 
these was delivered to the drains, which 
were laid under a lawn adjoining the best 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 183 

rooms of the house and a piazza that was 
much used. The net work of dranis 
began not more than fifteen feet from the 
edge of the piazza and the furthest corner 
of the section was not more than fifty 
feet away. The system worked most 
satisfactorily for eleven years, when the 
construction of a sewer in the adjoining 
street made it no longer necessary to use 
it. 

During the whole period of the experi- 
ment, the condition of the tiles and of the 
soil immediately adjoining them was 
frequently examined. If the opening were 
made immediately after the discharge of 
the tank, the earth near the drains had a 
decided odor, but all other times, even 
close to the open joints from which the 
discharge had been copious, there was 
absolutely nothing to suggest impurity. 
A handful of earth which a few hours 
before had been saturated with the foul 



184 SEWAGE DISPOSAL, 

liquid had no other appearance or odor 
than that taken at the same depth from a 
part of the lawn entirely beyond the 
influence of the system. 

This method of disposing of waste 
liquids has been used by many engineers 
and on hundreds of places in different 
parts of the country. So far as known, 
wherever the details of the system have 
been properly regulated, the result has 
been entirely satisfactory. 

In 1876, in connection with the sewer- 
age of Lenox, Mass., there being no other 
available means of outlet, a large flush- 
tank was built at the upper corner of a 
field near the village, and 10,000 feet of 
absorption drains were laid. This system 
was used until another outlet was pro- 
vided in 1892. Whenever it was prop- 
erly cared for it was completely suc- 
cessful. 

At the hotel at Bryn Mawr, Pa., a sys- 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 185 

teni even larger than that at Lenox has 
been in successful use since 1881. Here, 
the sewage had formerly been delivered 
into a brook which ran through private 
propert}^ The change was made to avoid 
legal proceedings threatened by the 
adjoining owner. A little difficulty oc- 
curred at first from an unequal distribu- 
tion of the flow and because of the steep 
grade necessarily given to some of the 
drains. These defects were remedied 
and the working of the whole system has 
since been satisfactory. 

At the Woman's Prison at Sherburn, 
Mass., where about 30,000 gallons of 
sewage were delivered per day, the con- 
ditions were extremely difficult. Only 
a small area of land at considerable eleva- 
tion could be reached, and this was of a 
very unfavorable character. The system 
here was on the whole successful, though 
owing, as is believed, to sluggish drainage 



1 86 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

through the heavy subsoil, the amount 
of drain tile used, 20,000 feet, at times 
proved inadequate to the work. Some 
years ago a public sewer was constructed 
into which the prison drain now delivers. 

There are few individual houses so far 
separated from each other that their best 
relief may not come by public sewerage, 
which have not sufficient ground about 
them for the successful application of this 
system. 

Although it was not the intention to 
enter in this volume so far into the 
practical technicalities of work as to use 
any considerable number of diagrams in 
illustration, it is thought that, as the 
system under discussion, though largely 
used In a few Eastern neighborhoods, is 
still little known over the country gener- 
ally, it will be proper to make an excep- 
tion here, and to reproduce from a 
descriptive article, published in the 



SEIVAGE DISPOSAL. 



187 



American Architect for March, 1892, the 
diagrams accompanying it. 

Figure 12 shows the construction of 
the double-chamber tank. The settHng- 
chamber A is 3. small, round cistern 
with a wide throat — not less than 




eighteen inches diameter — to facilitate 
the removal of Its scum and deposit. It 
receives sewage from a pipe turned down 
through the dome and barely trapped 
against the return of air — if deeply 
trapped, grease accumulates and 
obstructs the drain ; with this slight 



1 88 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

trap, the flow from an ordinary house 
suffices to keep it free. It overflows 
through a deeply-trapped pipe Into the 
discharglng-chamber D. It is divided by 
a wall into two chambers, the top of the 
wall being just at the overflow line. 
The compartment B, on the Inlet side, 
has its water considerably agitated by 
the inflow. Before the dividing-wall was 
adopted, this agitation was communi- 
cated to the contents of the whole cham- 
ber, and flocculent matters, which would 
settle to the bottom or float to the top in 
still water, were carried over by the cur- 
rent into the discharglng-chamber. This 
agitation is now confined to the compart- 
ment B, from which the liquid portion 
flows to the compartment C in a thin 
sheet over the top of the wall, in such a 
manner as not to disturb the contents of 
this second compartment, allowing floc- 
culent solids to settle quietly to its bot- 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 189 

torn. Under some circumstances, per- 
haps due to a higher temperature in the 
sewage, and this to its larger amount, the 
decomposition of the sediment and of 
the scum is sufficiently active to prevent 
accumulation to an injurious amount. 
In such cases, the settlinor-chamber need 
never be cleaned. This is not to be 
depended upon without occasional 
inspection. In the majority of cases it is 
necessary every few months to bail out 
the chamber and get rid of its accumula- 
tions, which should be buried or dug into 
the ground at once. 

The liquid overflow from the settling- 
chamber A to the discharging-chamber 
D represents practically the full amount 
of sewage brought down by the drain. 
The discharging-chamber should be 
made large enough to hold the product 
of at least twelve hours ; there is no 
objection to Its retaining twenty-four 



190 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 



hours' supply, — a longer retention would 
lead to too much putrefaction. This 
chamber is furnished with an automatic 
siphon ; the one shown is what is known 




FIG. 13. THE RHOADS-WILLIAMS SIPHON 



vzy 



as the Rhoads-Williams siphon. Its de- 
tails are shown In Figure 13. 

It depends for Its action on the sudden 
releasing of compressed air contained 
between the Inflow from the tank and 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 191 

the deep trap near the outlet. When 
the pressure is sufficient to force the 
water In the blow-off trap a, a, to the bot- 
tom of this trap, the air pressure Is 
released, and the head of water, which It 
had held in the tank, forces a full flow 
into the siphon and brings it rapidly into 
action. Air is Introduced for the break- 
ing of the siphon after the main flow has 
ceased by the admission of air from the 
drain through the pipe b, b. These 
siphons are sold by flush-tank dealers. 

The siphon is located entirely outside 
of the tank. This obviates the serious 
fouling of the siphon itself, which has 
always been a source of difficulty when it 
was placed within the tank. Its opening 
into the tank is funnel-shaped so as to 
take the flow rapidly, and to make sure 
that there will be no obstruction from 
such minor solid matters as the sewage 
may contain. It is not ordinarily found 



192 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

necessary to clean out the discharging- 
chamber, matters which would otherwise 
accumulate within it being held back in 
the settling-chamber. 

The outflow is a slightly putrid sewage 
containing more or less fine flocculent 
matter, not enough to interfere with the 
proper action of 2-inch absorption-drains. 
These absorption-drains may be placed 
at a greater or less distance from the 
tank as the tank may be at a greater or 
less distance from the house. They are 
made of ordinary round 2-inch tile in 
one-foot lengths, laid in earthenware 
gutters, their joints being open about 
one-fourth inch, and being protected 
against the entrance of earth by the 
loose-fitting cap laid on the top. The 
gutters and caps are of larger radius 
than the outside of the tile, so that prac- 
tically the whole joint is available for the 
escape of sewage into the ground. The 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 193 

surface of the gutter on which the tile 
is laid should be ten inches below the 
finished surface of the ground. In a 
reasonably porous surface-loam, it will 
suffice to have one foot of tile for each 
gallon of the contents of the discharg- 
ing-chamber. The tile, caps, and gutters 
are shown in Figure 28. 

If the soil is heavier, the length must 
be increased. An impervious clay is not 
well suited, under any circumstances, for 
this use, but where nothing else is avail- 
able there should be at least three feet of 
tile per gallon. The tile may be one 
continuous line, or a number of shorter 
lines, connected with the 4~inch main 
leadinor from the flush-tank. The tiles 
need not be more than three feet apart, 
though twice this distance is not unusual. 
In fact, the system is in this respect a 
very flexible one, and can be adapted to 
land of any shape or inclination. The 



194 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

fall of the main line from the tank to the 
absorption-drains should not, especially 
after coming within 20 feet of the first 
line of tiles, have a fall of more than 
4 inches to 100 feet. Its joints should 
be cemented, and the branches for 
connection with the tile lines should 
come out from the bottom of the tile, 
not from the middle, as is usual with 
branches of vitrified pipe. Special 
pieces for this purpose are to be ob- 
tained from the dealers. The absorp- 
tion-lines themselves should have a fall 
of not more than 2 inches per 100 
feet : more than this gives a tendency 
to an accumulation of sewage at the 
far end of the line, and if the line is 
long, to a breaking out of the sewage 
at the surface. 

Figures 14, 15, and 16 show three dif- 
ferent methods of applying this system, 
according to variations of the o^round. 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 



195 



In each case the dotted lines are con- 
tour-lines showing differences of eleva- 
tion of one foot. 

In Figure 14, the flush-tank A receives 
its sewao^e from the sink-drain leading^ 
from a corner of the house. Its dis- 




FIG. 14. 



FIG. 15. 



FIG. 16, 



charge is through a direct line to the 
point c, starting at the tank at a depth of 
three or four feet below the surface and 
coming to within a foot of the surface at 
the point c. At the point c the main 
drain is turned at an angle and has three 
different outlets, to be used, one at a 



196 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

time, in alternation. The first one com- 
municates with two parallel drains at the 
bottom of the field, these having a sufifi- 
cient combined length to receive the 
whole discharo^e of the tank. The sec- 
ond one runs parallel to the first, to 
two absorption drains corresponding with 
the first two. The third communicates 
with the other system of three parallel 
lines, which are shorter, having about the 
same aggregate length as the two of the 
other systems. They are carried around 
nearly parallel to the contours to secure 
the requisite slight fall. 

In Figure 15 the flush-tank is fed by 
two drains from the house and connects, 
as shown, with three series of three 
drains each. The land is much more 
nearly level, and the nine absorption- 
drains are in ground having a total fall 
of only one foot. 

In Figure 16 the flush-tank is fed by a 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 197 

single drain, not straight, and connects 
with its alternating gate. There are two 
series of drains, four on one side of the 
field and four on another, while a third 
line connects with the series of three 
shorter drains on each side of the medial 
line. 

The flush-tank may be placed in any 
position and at any distance from the 
house, and the field may be at any dis- 
tance from the flush-tank to which a 
proper fall can be obtained. 

One modification of this system, which 
will obviate much of the difficulty by 
requiring a greatly reduced retention of 
solid matters, where indeed a coarse 
screen may, in some cases, be made to 
hold back all that is necessary to retain, 
consists in the use of larger absorption- 
tiles, say 4-inch or 6-inch, with open 
joints, fully one-half inch wide and laid 
in coarse gravel or other very open 



198 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

material just under the surface of the 
ground In two, or better, three series, 
each of which has sufficient capacity in 
its pipes to receive the entire contents of 
the tank at each discharge. The dis- 
charge being at intervals of from twelve 
to twenty-four hours, the liquid sewage 
with its soluble and its finer suspended 
impurities will have ample time to leak 
out into the soil; and during the period 
of intermission, while the other two 
series of drains are being used, worms* 
beetles, and other insects will consume, 
or decomposition will destroy, the rela- 
tively small amount of deposited matter, 
which, however, might be sufficient to 
obstruct 2-inch tiles. 

A still further modification consists in 
making the drains of similar large tiles 
of " horseshoe " shape, laid In a trench 
filled with coarse gravel or broken 
stone. The capacity of the tiles and of 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 199 

the voids amono^ the stones In each series 
should be sufficient to receive more than 
the full contents of the tank. 

Cross-sections of 4-inch horseshoe 
tiles, laid In trenches filled with stone 
or gravel, are shown in Figures 17, 18, 
and 19. 

In Figure 17, the ground is supposed 
to be reasonably absorptive, like garden 
mold. In Figure 18, the natural soil is 
very heavy and non-absorptive, and is 
level or nearly so. It is thoroughly 
underdrained and is covered with sand or 
gravel in low ridges, being deeper at the 
absorption-drains than midway between 
them. The purification takes place 
entirely In this porous and well-aerated 
surface, the clarified water sinking into 
the drained ground below. In Figure 
19, the land Is non-absorptive and has a 
decided slope. It should be well under- 
drained with tiles running up and down 



200 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 



the slope. The surface Is covered with 
sand or gravel, and is divided into sec- 
tions by banks of clay (under the sand) 
at the foot of each section. The sewage 
is delivered into a horseshoe tile, with 




FIG. 17. 




CLAYEY SOIL 



FIG. 18. 



broken stone, at the upper side of each 
section, and is purified (and its water is 
absorbed) before it reaches the clay bank 
below, or is held by this bank until it is 
disposed of. 

This question is often raised with 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 



20I 



reference to the sub-surface system : " If 
the dire results of the use of the ordinary- 
leaching cesspool are so serious, why is it 
not just as bad to discharge the same 
materials into the ground by leaching 




drains?" The difference is radical. In 
the case of the cesspool, the leaching 
takes place almost entirely at such a con- 
siderable distance from the surface that 
the exclusion of air makes suitable bac- 
terial action impossible, while the de- 
livery through drains laid immediately 
under the sod is into aerated ground 
which is teeming with bacteria. 



202 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

In the system described above, a cer- 
tain amount of putrefaction is inevitable, 
and putrefaction is always objectionable. 
When once Its fsecal matter is sub- 
merged, so as to prevent the exhalation of 
Its odors Into the atmosphere, /'r^^'/^ sew- 
age Is entirely inoffensive to the smell. 
It Is simply so much dirty water. It 
might be thrown in considerable quanti- 
ties on to a grass plat without other 
objection than that which would attach 
to the sight of its solid portions. Unless 
thrown so frequently and in such quanti- 
ties on the same spot as to saturate the 
ground, exclude the air, and so prevent 
proper bacterial action, it would produce 
no odor whatever, barring the trifling odor 
of exposed faeces. The same sewage re- 
tained for two or three days in a barrel, 
vault, or cesspool would enter into a state 
of offensive decomposition, and would con- 
stitute a nuisance of a serious character. 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 203 

The real problem in the disposal of 
household sewage, and indeed of the 
sewage of large institutions, and even of 
towns, is to bring it into contact with a 
suitable oxidizing medium while in so 
fresh a condition as not to be offensive, 
and to make sure that the drains and 
other appliances through which it passes 
shall at no time become offensive. 
Offensive odor is, of course, chiefly to be 
guarded against ; but offense to the sight 
would also constitute an important objec- 
tion. No method has as yet been de- 
vised by which the whole process could 
be appropriately carried on on the front 
lawn of a dwelling-house. We have, 
however, arrived at a point where, even 
In a reasonably secluded back-yard, all of 
the conditions may be satisfied. Setting 
aside exceptional cases, where only the 
sub-surface system with a double-cham- 
bered Hush-tank would be acceptable, the 



204 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

work may be done In a great majority of 
Instances by a system of surface disposal 
or of sub-surface disposal with large 
pipes, with an automatic flush-tank which 
may at all times be thoroughly aerated 
and which may be cleansed with suffi- 
cient frequency to prevent odor from its 
sliming. Especially In connection with 
such a flush-tank can the ventilation of 
the main drain and soil-pipes be main- 
tained with such completeness as to pre- 
vent the accumulation of odors In them. 
The objection to placing a flush-tank of 
this character quite near to a house Is 
rather fancied than real. 

The nearer It Is and the more con- 
stantly subjected to inspection, the 
greater will be the certainty of keeping it 
always in good condition. On the other 
hand, the farther from the house, the 
more will the solid parts of the sewage 
be broken up In transit, the less Impera- 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 205 

tivewlll be the need for scrupulous clean- 
liness, and the less the care required ; 
civilized living, however, requires great 
care in all such matters. Civilization is 
only lately beginning to take cognizance 
of this requirement, and the public at 
large is still disposed to like best a sys- 
tem which calls no attention to itself, 
and of which the objectionable features 
are so hidden as to be easily forgotten. 
Even under their best development, such 
systems belong to the '' out-of-sight-out- 
of-mind" class. 

Accessibility and exposure to constant 
inspection, now universal in the best 
plumbing practice of the day, are equally 
desirable in the case of apparatus for the 
disposal of sewage outside of the house. 
The cesspool, the vault, and the double- 
chambered flush-tank will soon have be- 
come things of the past, among those 
who care for good sanitary conditions. 



2o6 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

Their places will be taken by some de- 
vice having the essential features of the 
system described below, combining effi- 
ciency with the possibility of, and the de- 
mand for, perfect cleanliness. This be- 
ing accomplished, the *' horrid drains " 
will soon cease to exist, or to be thought 
about. 

It is not to be supposed that this pre- 
cise manner of applying the system will 
long remain the accepted one. But the 
principle of the arrangement seems to 
embody all the elements of permanence. 
This principle may be thus stated : 

Deliver the sewage as soon as pro- 
duced, through thoroughly flushed and 
ventilated pipes and drains, to a point 
outside of the house ; hold back its 
coarser substances by some form of 
screen which will allow everything to 
pass that can, in an unobjectionable way, 
be disposed of with the sew^age ; accumu- 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 207 

late the reo^ular flow throuoh the drain 
in a receptacle large enough to hold the 
supply of a few hours, or of a day, as the 
case may be ; the receptacle becoming 
full, discharge its contents automatically, 
rapidly, and completely, on to the surface 
of the ground, or into drains immedi- 
ately below the surface, for Its final, 
complete, and inoffensive disposal ; 
arrange the screen and tank in such a 
way that they may be kept in a cleanly 
condition with little labor and without 
requiring the constant supervision and 
naeilinof of the master of the house. 
The appliances shown in the Figures 20 
to 27, and the method of working 
described in connection therewith, seem 
to constitute a satisfactory application of 
this principle. 

Figure 20 shows a vertical, longitudi- 
nal section, Figure 21a plan, and Figure 
22 a vertical cross-section of a new form 



2o8 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

of flush-tank, of which the Inside meas- 
urements are, a width of one foot eight 
inches, a length of six feet, and a height 
of two feet. At a distance of four 
inches below the top on the long sides, 
a ledge two inches wide is formed by 
setting the brickwork of the walls that 
far back. 

This ledge is intended to receive wire- 
cloth screens twenty-four inches square, 
shown in Figure 24. The length of the 
tank may be increased to any number of 
multiples of two feet in order to obtain 
the desired capacity. A tank eight feet 
long would take four screens, a tank ten 
feet long, five screens, etc. The uniform 
width is maintained, as the screens are 
made only in the one size, and as they 
would be liable to sag if much wider 
between their supports. The bottom of 
the tank is so graded as to deliver its 
contents entirely at the center of the 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL 




2IO 



SEIVAGE DISPOSAL. 



discharging-end, where there is a depres- 
sion equal to the receiving-height of the 
throat of the siphon at its narrowest 
part. At the end of the tank there is 
built a recess fifteen inches square to 
receive the screening-cage shown in 



^^:p775;>^ 



fTTTTfTT 




Section A B 



Figure 23.* This cage is made of 
galvanized-iron-vvire cloth with i-inch 
meshes. It is entirely closed at the top 
and bottom and on three of its sides. 
One of its sides, that which is to be 
placed next to the inflowing drain, has 



* As shown in the illustrations, the sewage enters at one end 
of the tank and flows out at the other. It will be better to 
make the inlet and the outlet at the same end, so that deposits 
forming near the inlet will have the full flow to remove them. 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 



211 



an opening- at its top ten inches square. 
This cage constitutes a complete screen 
to withhold whatever will not pass a i- 
inch mesh, — paper and all solids of con- 
siderable size. The agitation of its con- 
tents by the inflow will break up much 
of the softer solid parts of the sewage 





FIG. 23. 



FIG. 24. 



and carry them through the meshes ; 
what will not so pass must be retained, 
because it would tend to obstruct pipes 
in the case of sub-surface delivery, and 
might make objectionable deposits on 
the ground in the case of surface 
delivery. These cages are furnished in 
duplicate, so that whenever one is 
removed for cleaning, another can be 
substituted for it immediately. The one 



2T2 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

removed, after standing a few minutes, 
will have parted with all of its liquids, 
and its solid contents can be shaken 
out through the lo-inch opening and 
removed, or dug into the ground. 
When the cage and the covers, Figures 
23 and 24, are all in place, the whole tank 
is sufficiently screened from observation 
and is protected against leaves and rub- 
bish which might otherwise get access 
to its contents. As often as experience 
shows it to be necessary, perhaps daily, 
the covering-screens, Figure 24, should 
be removed, after discharging the tank, 
and its walls and bottom should be 
thoroughly swept down, the sewage 
accumulated in its outlet being sufficient 
for such washing. As above indicated, 
the frequency with which this cleansing 
should be performed may vary according 
to nearness to, or remoteness from, the 
house, walks, etc. 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 213 

Figure 29 shows the masonry con- 
struction of this tank, the material being 
brick, glazed on the inner face, and mar- 
ble or other slabs at the top. 

The tank is emptied, after its con- 
tents reach a certain height, by the ac- 
tion of a suitable automatic siphon, 
placed entirely outside of the tank, hav- 
ing a funnel-shaped inlet for the entrance 
of the sewage. This siphon will require 
no attention. Whenever the tank fills 
to the discharging-line, the whole 
accumulation will flow out rapidly, and 
when the flow ceases the siphon will 
"break," allowing no further discharge 
until the tank has filled aoaln. 

The tanks may be built of ordinary 
brickwork, laid and coated Inside and out 
with Portland cement, or with stone or 
concrete similarly coated. They may be 
cheaply but simply made, or they may 
even be lined and capped with white 



214 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

marble. Another excellent material 
would be white or straw-colored glazed 
brick laid with close joints. Elegance 
of finish will not be altogether useless ; 
for the finer they are the more easily and 
the more certainly will these tanks be 
kept in good condition. 

In a few cases, all others so far heard 
from working satisfactorily, it was found 
that the flocculent matter passing the 
screen clogged the 4-inch absorption-tiles 
after a time. This was obviated by con- 
structing a settling-chamber, such as is 
shown at the left end of Figure 12, in 
the course of the drain from the house to 
the flush-tank. This may be necessary 
in other cases. For surface disposal, it 
has been clearly shown not to be 
required. 

Figure 25 shows the flush-tank, illus- 
trated in Figures 20 to 24, placed at 
some distance from the house, receiving 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 



215 



sewage from three house-drains, and 
deHvering its contents for surface dis- 
posal by the use of three alternating 
systems of surface gutters or barriers to 




2 1 




FIG. 2S. 



FIG. 26. 



equalize the flow. These sections are 
marked A, B, and C, the gates a, b, and 
c regulating the distribution. In A and 
B the sewao^e is delivered alonor- the 



2l6 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 



upper edge of gently sloping land. If 
the land is steeper, the gutters or barriers 
must be nearer together to equalize the 
, ^ flow. Water escaping 

from the upper gutter, 
or barrier i, is collected 
again for a uniform flow 
at barrier 2, and again 
at barrier 3. Disposal 
for section B operates 
in the same manner. On 
section C, the gutters or 
barriers being mucli 
longer, only two are 
needed. These illustra- 
tions are not drawn to 
scale, and are only in- 
tended to illustrate the general features 
of the process. The gutters or barriers 
must be absolutely horizontal, and so 
arranged that the sewage escaping from 
them will flow evenly over the land 




FIG. 27. 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL, 217 

below. The distribution may require the 
cutting of a leader-furrow here and there 
in the grass with a spade. 

This method of surface irrigation 




removes absolutely all impurity from the 
sewage ; what becomes of it after it has 
passed over a sufficient area of ground is 
immaterial. If it escapes into the brook 
or other water-course, it will by that time 
have become purer than the water of the 
brook itself. 

In place of the gates a, b, and c, for 
changing the flow from one tract to 
another, I am now usine a cast-Iron dis- 
tributing chamber, shown In Figure 30. 



2l8 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 



Its operation Is indicated by Figures 31, 
32, and ^^. The pipe A from the flush- 
tank deHvers into this, and from its 
opposite side run three lines, leading to 




three sets of absorption tiles, x, y and z. 
Flat plates, which act as deflectors, are 
hinged at h, h, fitting closely to the bot- 
tom of the chamber. When these plates 
are set as shown in Figure 31, the flow is 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 219 

delivered to llnej^'. When turned to the 
position indicated in Figure 32, the sew- 
age is discharged into z. When placed 
as shown in Figure 2)?)y ^^^^ outlet x 
receives the flow. These distributing 
chambers are made by the Dececo Co., 
146 High Street, Boston, Mass. 

Figure 26 shows a system in which the 
same tank is used, receivinor the flow 
from four house-drains, and delivering 
"Its sewage Into absolutely level, wide 
trenches, of suflicient length. In the 
case shown, there are two of these 
trenches returned on themselves to give 
sufificient length. They are marked a, a, 
a, and b, b, b. In connection with the 
same system, there is shown a system of 
surface irrigation on sloping land. The 
satisfactory use of the trenches, a, a, a, 
and b, b, b, requires land of very absorp- 
tive character, the more porous the bet- 
ter. The best of all is a very fine gravel. 



2 20 SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 

As the trenches become filled on the dis- 
charge of the flush-tank, the liquid soak- 
ing away into the ground, there is left 
a felt-like coating on the surface, which 
requires either a sufficient intermission 




FIG. 30. 

of use to be destroyed by exposure to 
the air, or, what accomplishes the same 
purpose, a thorough raking of the sur- 
face from time to time into the material 
in which the trenches are cut. 

Figure 27 shows the same flush-tank 
surrounded by a screen of evergreens, 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 221 

s, s ; two systems of sub-surface absorp- 
tion-drains similar to those shown in 
Figures 14, 15, and 16; and one system 
of surface disposal similar to those 
shown in Figure 25. 

The variation of details, such as the 
size and location of the flush-tank, the 
arrangement, location, and extent of the 
surface gutters, or barriers, the horizon- 
tal trenches, the sub-surface absorption- 
drains, etc., may be almost infinite, so 
that the character of the soil, the forma- 
tion of the surface, the use to which the 
land is to be put, the necessity for con- 
cealment, etc., may be accommodated in 
all cases. The flow from the flush-tank 
to the absorption-field is conveniently 
directed to the different sections by a 
simple gate-chamber made for the pur- 
pose. 

While gutters cut into the ground will 
be effective in collecting and equalizing 



222 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 



the flow, they have the drawback that 
they retain sewage after the flow ceases, 
and become odorous. The porous bar- 
riers (of broken stone, gravel, etc.) allow 




FIG. 33. 



the whole flow to pass with only such 
delay as is needed to equalize the dis- 
tribution. It is best to lay these bar- 
riers on a narrow strip of brick paving. 
It may with advantage be repeated 



SEWAGE DISPOSAL. 223 

here that while this system of disposal 
seems to be as nearly perfect as is possi- 
ble in the present state of the art, no 
such system will withstand neglect. It 
affords a perfect solution of one of the 
most difficult and dangerous problems 
connected with life in districts where 
sewers are not available, and the com- 
pleteness of the result to be secured 
amply compensates for the slight amount 
of regular attention required. 



